The Joys of Womanhood

I know that there are many, many joys in being a woman. But today, I'm not feeling it. About six months ago, I went on birth control to help normalize my hormones. For a variety of reasons, I went off them this month. And, my body is going haywire on me! Emotions run amok, headaches, cramping, exhaustion, etc. It's delightful. My poor kids have forgotten that Mom used to get this way once a month -- I think even my husband had put it out of his mind. The only good thing is that I can realize what is causing it all now which helps me to control my desire to snap at everyone around me, weep over nothing, and curl up on the couch wrapped in blankets eating chocolate by the pound. Oh, don't get me wrong, I still do those things but I can often stop myself or limit the time spent doing them. It's a huge aggravation though!

Otherwise, we are doing fine. It is unusually cold here in California now. This morning it's 27 degrees here. Two nights ago, it rained. The roads will be icy this morning which is not good. We have windy mountain roads that are treacherous under the best of conditions. Many Californians simply don't know how to drive on icy roads. Yesterday, Greg took us to school and drove 25 and under the whole way. We didn't get passed but we did see someone roar out of their driveway ahead of us way too quickly. Thankfully, they didn't hit ice while we were watching but I did hear that the tow trucks were busy yesterday. Today should be worse -- it's colder this morning.

We get ice on the playground at school and no matter how carefully you watch, the kids will try to slip and slide on it. The school has started putting out salt on the ice. I hate what the salt does to the plants and stuff but as the principal says, "I don't want to see any blood!"

Yesterday, I saw ravens settling in the for the night at the school. There were 16 in one tree. I've never seen that many before at the school -- of course, when I got the camera out some had flown off but still. There was lots of billing and cooing going on between those pairs. Very cool!