Southeastern Virginia got hit with a bad snowstorm last week, one we locals are calling \u201cSnowpocalypse 2018.\u201d While I personally did not go outside with a ruler or anything, friends posted photos on Facebook where their yards were more than 12\u201d deep in places. Those of you in more northern states may laugh and call us lightweights, but the truth is that our local area has no reasonable mass transit that can take the place of cars for most commuters, nor adequate equipment to mitigate bad road conditions for drivers so that business can proceed as usual. We just don\u2019t get enough snow every year to make such purchases necessary. So when we do get the one (or maybe two) bad snows each winter that cover our roads with snow and ice for a day or two, many business just shut down.<\/p>\n
Thus last Thursday and Friday turned into \u201csnow leave\u201d for my small office. Needless to say, I was as excited as a kid with a snow day, especially knowing I could use that time to work on my novel for four days straight. Then Smudge got sick on Saturday and despite the awful conditions of the roads, we ended up at the emergency vet, a twenty-minute drive that took us forty-five minutes to cover.<\/p>\n
Don\u2019t panic \u2026 all is well, now. But sheesh, when our boy is sick, I can\u2019t think of anything else. Ya know?<\/p>\n
I don\u2019t have any two-legged children, though our grey furbaby demands his fair share of time and attention. He hates<\/em> our office, with those metal clicky things (computers) that keep us so preoccupied that we don\u2019t jump at his every meow. Sometimes it\u2019s impossible to get anything done in the office, which is why I have a laptop. He is more amenable to my computer work if I am on the couch, where he can sleep next to me (touching my leg, if at all possible), or make pancakes on the cushion beside me. Every now and then he will wake and pat me with his paw to say, \u201cDon\u2019t forget me, mom,\u201d or \u201cI need hugs RIGHT NOW, mom.\u201d<\/p>\n He\u2019s a talker, too. If we ignore him too long, he\u2019ll walk all through the apartment making his displeasure known to all (including the neighbors).<\/p>\n So when we left him at the vet yesterday, I planned to come home and use the time to get ahead of schedule. You know, type uninterrupted for as long as I could while he was otherwise occupied. But that\u2019s not how it happened. I couldn\u2019t stop worrying. He\u2019s an old boy \u2013 almost 17 years \u2013 so at this point anything could go wrong, and take him from us before we\u2019re ready. Instead of working Saturday, we spent the day on the couch distracting ourselves with mindless television, namely \u201cMiss Fisher\u2019s Murder Mysteries,\u201d on Netflix. Only Sunday morning, after the vet called to say he was better, did I get back to work. I did make my target word count for the day, but after we picked Smudge up that evening, we spent the rest of the evening with him. I\u2019ll probably do the same thing tonight. He\u2019s not back to himself just yet, and his need for comfort has to come first.<\/p>\n Writing is important, yes. I try<\/em> to do it every day. But some things will win out every time over my characters\u2019 voices. Family is at the top of that list, and Smudge is definitely family.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Southeastern Virginia got hit with a bad snowstorm last week, one we locals are calling \u201cSnowpocalypse 2018.\u201d While I personally did not go outside with a ruler or anything, friends posted photos on Facebook where their yards were more than 12\u201d deep in places. Those of you in more northern states may laugh and call…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-537","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-blog-posts"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p8n0kX-8F","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":161,"url":"https:\/\/www.dremadeoraich.com\/index.php\/2017\/04\/09\/blink-blink\/","url_meta":{"origin":537,"position":0},"title":"Blink Blink","author":"DremaDeoraich","date":"April 9, 2017","format":false,"excerpt":"You know, it just doesn\u2019t seem like it should be a new year. Again. Didn\u2019t we just have one of those last week? I swear, with every passing year the time seems to scream by with increasing speed. Remember when we were kids and an afternoon seemed to last an\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Archived Writings"","block_context":{"text":"Archived Writings","link":"https:\/\/www.dremadeoraich.com\/index.php\/category\/archived-writings\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":6673,"url":"https:\/\/www.dremadeoraich.com\/index.php\/2025\/09\/17\/memory-of-water\/","url_meta":{"origin":537,"position":1},"title":"Memory of Water","author":"DremaDeoraich","date":"September 17, 2025","format":false,"excerpt":"By Emmi It\u00e4ranta \u00a9 April 16, 2024, Voyager File Size: 2.6 MB 274 pages ISBN-13: 978-0062326164 Noria is a 17-year-old in the Scandinavian Union, which is occupied by the Chinese state of New Qian. Global warming changed everything. 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And he isn\u2019t alone; Circe, Poseidon, Hephaestus, Hermes, and other Big Names make appearances in this first book of the Latter Day\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Reviews"","block_context":{"text":"Reviews","link":"https:\/\/www.dremadeoraich.com\/index.php\/category\/reviews\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.dremadeoraich.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/02\/BadBloodCvr-200x300.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":180,"url":"https:\/\/www.dremadeoraich.com\/index.php\/2017\/04\/09\/why-bad-things-happen-to-good-characters\/","url_meta":{"origin":537,"position":4},"title":"Why Bad Things Happen to Good Characters","author":"DremaDeoraich","date":"April 9, 2017","format":false,"excerpt":"I\u2019ve heard it stated over and over at conferences, in blog posts and articles, and from my editor, Paula. Good writing isn\u2019t about a character, or group of characters. It isn\u2019t even about those characters doing things. It\u2019s about those characters being prevented from achieving a goal. The whole point\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Blog Posts"","block_context":{"text":"Blog Posts","link":"https:\/\/www.dremadeoraich.com\/index.php\/category\/blog-posts\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":2744,"url":"https:\/\/www.dremadeoraich.com\/index.php\/2022\/06\/17\/secrets-in-the-mirror\/","url_meta":{"origin":537,"position":5},"title":"Secrets in the Mirror","author":"DremaDeoraich","date":"June 17, 2022","format":false,"excerpt":"By Leslie Kain Atmosphere Press ISBN 978-1-63988-407-0 Ebook. \u00a9 2022 Mirror twins Devon and Gavin are raised in a household where men are tough, where their father believes Devon will always be a winner and Gavin will always be a loser. 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