There went the sun . . . . all my children

I looked at the Yahoo ten-day weather forecast yesterday afternoon.  It showed ten graphic squares with clouds, rain droplets and temperatures,  ranging from 45-60.  That would mean 11 straight days of rain.

I looked at the ten-day weather forecast only after growing weary of the gloom and nonstop rain that had fallen all night and all day.  My attitude had hit the wall after several attempts of willing myself to get out there and do stuff in spite of getting drenched within minutes.  Finally, enough was enough.

So, out of curiosity, I came upstairs and peeked at that ten-day prediction, compliments of the Weather Channel.  Something inside my head kept warning me it would be ten days straight.  And, when the graphics for each day through June 7 opened, sure enough, my head was right.  

To call this weather outlook depressing just doesn't come close.

Visions of what to do inside through ten days of rain were cloudy, at best.

Later the KREM news came on, and the weekend weather forecaster told us she was wearing her bright yellow shirt in an effort to brighten up our day.  I have to hand it to her for, at least, making the effort.  

She did tell us, however, that today would be the nice day of the next week.  Then, she kinda got mixed up and said it would be a good week ahead, warmer but lots of rain.  I disagree with her assessment that it's gonna be a good week.

This morning the Spokesman provided some glimmers of hope.  The graphic showed a week of clouds, a couple of days in the high 60s and "some" chance of rain each day. 

The last time we had ongoing, gloomy, wet weather like we've seen so much of this spring, Willie pulled Annie's bottom tooth out.  Her tooth wasn't quite ready to come out.  She was barely  5 at the time. 

That was the same year that I got addicted to the soap opera  "All My Children."  It rained every day in June that year.  So, there was lots of time spent in the house with "both of my children."  To say we all got tired of each other in such close quarters would be sorely understated.

Sometime during that month, out of desperation, I brought in the rubber raft we'd bought for the kids.  Yeah, sure, we could use it outside in the fields, but we didn't want to go outside into the wet fields with tall, cold grass when it kept raining all the time.  So, the kids pretended they were floating through a lake in the living room.

The raft provided a nice diversion, but after a while, even it turned into a weapon of tooth destruction when one afternoon,  out of my sight, its thin, nylon rope got stuck somehow in Annie's mouth.  Someone pulled one direction while someone else pulled the other.  

Things were pretty quiet in the living room when suddenly, I turned around in the kitchen to see Annie with tears in her eyes,  holding her hands over her mouth. Blood was dripping from her hands.  

I quickly pulled them away from her face and noticed a tooth gone, root and all.  Can't remember where it was, but we found it amidst the blood and the blubbering.  

Of course, amidst the blubbering, she told me Willie did it.  I went looking for Willie and couldn't find him.  He was hiding in one of the bedrooms cuz he knew something major had happened.  

I don't remember the exact words of my lecture, but it was delivered quickly cuz we had a premature tooth extraction on our hands.  I started calling dentists' offices and learned very quickly what time it was.  It was time for dentists to go home.  Somebody told me that if you stuffed it back in its original cavity, it might reconnect with Annie's gum.

If memory serves me correctly, I don't think that worked.  Annie had a gap on her bottom row of teeth until she aged enough for the permanent tooth to come in.

The rain continued for several more days.  The kids were more careful with that nylon rope, and I continued to get more and more addicted to "All My Children" while trying to find an indoors diversion from my own children who were climbing the walls by then.

I have no children to drive me bananas if this 2010 rain should continue for several days; I just have grandpuppies, and they will stay outside rather than pretending to be sailors aboard inside rubber rafts. 

I could always clean the house some more or read a book, but I'm an outside person and will probably resort to some really crazy tactics to keep myself from going stir crazy or,  even worse than that,  turning on the boob tube to see if Greg still likes Jenny.  Who knows?  Maybe they've each had a dozen spouses by now.