Here are a few very brief thoughts I’ve pondered while being snowed in this week:

On Ring Neighbors

It seems like every other hour my Ring Doorbell app dings to alert me of new action in the Neighbors feature. I normally love this because I’m the unofficial Neighborhood Watch but every ding I’ve heard this week has come with yet another jackass asking what roads are like in Farragut, on Kingston Pike, in Turkey Creek, on the Interstate or on Highway 321. I understand some people planned poorly and need groceries or prescriptions. Many people have jobs that require their in-person presence and any number of other legit reasons to need to get out but come on. I have four-wheel-drive, of course, but I haven’t gotten out because it hasn’t been above freezing for more than just a handful of hours in the last FIVE DAYS and our street is visibly trashed. How badly do you need to go to Wal-Mart? I want to sue these people for gross misuse of the Ring Doorbell Neighbors feature. I want to go back to the days of “this coyote was in my driveway this morning!” and “did anyone else hear those gunshots (that were clearly fireworks)?”

On Being Weather-Ready

While we haven’t had much of a need to get out this week other than going stir-crazy, I’ve been constantly irritated by how ill-prepared we were for this weather. Our HVAC is in great shape (it’s brand-new) and we never lost power, thank the gods. We also accidentally loaded up on a week’s worth of groceries early in the weekend because of an intended Sunday meal-prep day. Ultimately, we’re in great shape. But being the born-and-raised East Tennesseans we are, neither one of us really have appropriate clothing to go play in the snow for a long period of time and we still don’t own a snow shovel. We played in the snow for about 20 minutes one of the first days and built a tiny snowman but decided we were freezing, wet and needed to go back inside. 

I’m also embarrassed by how many ways I Googled methods of making your own snow shovel and/or plow before I finally gave up and just hit parts of my driveway with our garden shovel. Local stores are going to be sold out of snow shovels for the foreseeable future, but bet your ass I’m buying the next one I see when I’m able to get back out.

On Missing the Gym

I haven’t been out of the house since I hit the gym on Monday morning, which means I haven’t worked out in four days. Which means I’m a testosterone-riddled mess that’s anxious, angry, on edge, frustrated, unable to focus, depressed and lethargic. Which then also means I don’t know how Katie hasn’t murdered me yet because I’m kinda miserable to be around currently. And I’m 100% natty, so I don’t know how dudes on juice handle themselves in situations like this (actually I do: they handle themselves with squeaky voices, tiny testicles, acne and receding hairlines).

On Cultural Differences

One of the highlights of my week was meeting with my direct report in São Paulo, Brazil. It’s currently in the 90s there and it’s miserable. She told me Brazil doesn’t really get snow except sometimes in the southernmost region. But even then, she said, it’s not “real” snow and that, “It’s not the kind where you can build those things you all can build. Those things, they have a name … what are they? Snow dolls?”

That may not be what they’re called but that’s what I’m going to be calling them forevermore.

On Rad Music Releases

Today is a big day for awesome new releases. I’m currently playing the shit out of Green Day’s new drop Saviors and Neck Deep’s self-titled new release. Also digging new tunes/album releases from The Speakeasy (new to me), Vial, IDLES and Desiccated.

On Weird Dreams That May or May Not Be Coming True

I’ve had a dream for the last 20 years of my life to be in a Misfits cover band for one night only. In my mind, we’d land a gig, pound it out for an hour, then never do it again. I’ve since expressed that dream to a fellow musician who is now interested in contributing to the project and now we’re sort-of talking about it. I’ve since progressed it a little just to make it totally count – taking it from an hour-long Misfits-only set to doing a four-part set, much like most cover bands, made up of two sets of general punk, one set of all Ramones and one set of all Misfits. I think I’d still love to never do it again.

On Playing Old Games

I’ve been slowly selling off all of my old video games and many of the systems. Before our wedding, I sold my Xbox and games, Xbox 360 and games, Sega Genesis and games, then many of my PS2, Wii and N64 games, though I held onto those consoles. I’ve since sold what was left of my Nintendo 64 games with the exception of 007 Goldeneye, the greatest video game ever made. A coworker has claimed my original Tony Hawk Pro Skater, Resident Evil 2 and Donkey Kong 64 games but I’ve been unable to bring them to him since I’ve been working remotely this week. That means I’ve just been playing DK64 all week and loving it all over again. There are worse things I could be doing.

Stay warm out there, friends.

-JS