Mrs.J

1 minute ago, nw baltimore wx said:

I've got a Breckenridge CO earthcam opened and just flurries so far.  If that was here, we'd be screaming, "Bust!!"

I have a friend who is on a family road trip in SD currently. They are in Custer State Park and were supposed to be tent camping. They opted to stay in a lodge last night which was a good idea. They woke to about 6" of snow already on the ground from overnight. 

1 hour ago, mappy said:

our AC died yesterday. So between juggling my work schedule, Mr Maps schedule, the kid's schedule, now we have to also wrangle dogs from the HVAC guy who shows up in 30 minutes.

Happy First day of school! lol is it happy hour yet?

Yea I agree with @RDM. Ours stopped last month. We have a maintenance plan so did not have to pay the after hour rates and got a discount on labor. But it was just a bad insulator. Replaced and all was good. Hope your fix is easy and quick. 

6 minutes ago, Eskimo Joe said:

FCPS seems to be pretty on the ball. Other jurisdictions in MD have been looking to them as kind of the state leader in this rapid transition to online education. What's going to be interesting is to see what sticks around for winter days. I can certainly see the 3" - 6" storms become online learning days to cut down the issues. What's going to be interesting are events where there is a forecast of more widespread power or Internet outages, such as ice storms in central or western MD and schools are just closed outright.  

Did not know that. FCPS has been using Schoology for the last 2 years. The older Miss J's freshman year certain teachers at the HS level were chosen to use it 100% in their classrooms. Her French teacher was one of those teachers. All MS and HS the year after that went to using it. So those kids and families are familiar with it. ES schools just transitioned to it this year. 

Yes I am curious about snow days from now on and how they will be handled. I am aware of all the HS's in Frederick now have cell towers installed on their grounds and that has helped a lot with in school online access. Not sure about the tower situation around the county for more rural areas. Although out of 44,000 students only around 800 were not able to get logged on this past spring even with a hot spot. So the tower situation for those without cable or fiber may be better than I would have thought. 

1 minute ago, Eskimo Joe said:

Schools are being asked to change ~200 years of instruction practice in under 3 months. We're also finding out what parts of the country had inequitable access to reliable Internet.

Yea I expected issues especially today with a lot of systems going on as their first day today. We live 1/4 mile from my girls school which has a brand new tower installed on the property. I believe it was a server issue most likely with the online platform with this issue. Loudoun's first day is today and they are now using the same platform as Frederick. I think the western part of Frederick Co. might be on the same servers as Loudoun and we went down over here. 

All back up and running now though. School system was super quick with getting the issue resolved with the online platform. Much better communication than back in the spring. 

Sun back out over here. 78/76 it really did not cool off at all after all the rain. Currently sitting at .46".

1 minute ago, H2O said:

My concern would be this first round being close enough to steal all the juice in the air

I can say my area while currently under rain missed out on the super big stuff. 

Ok human barometer here. My head all of a sudden just feels like it is going to explode. Got a pressure headache that has made me have to sit down it hurts that bad. My left ear canal hurts so much.  Currently under what I would call gentle storm. 

81/76 here with thunder. My area seems to be in a dry slot for now. Opened the back door and OMG so muggy. 

That Tornado warned storm is to my East. Storm coming over from VA to my west is warned. 

9 minutes ago, yoda said:

Ugh it's hot and humid out... we better get some storms this afternoon 

It would be nice to get at least a decent storm. Would help me justify the stabbing eye ball pain I had all day yesterday from pressure in my head. 

23 minutes ago, Eskimo Joe said:

Same in Gaithersburg

Had a quick passing shower sun starting to come back now. 

Completely covered in thick clouds over here now. No sun coming through. 

77/74 here with sun powering through the cloud deck. Tropical feeling out. 

I just have to say we are 3 days into online learning and the youngest Miss J, who was bullied horribly last year, has had her best ever start to school since 1st grade. She told me yesterday that she likes not feeling stressed about the bullying. And Mr. J and I can see the difference. 

Every cloud has a silver lining 

Want to thank all for the kind words and acknowledgement. Oscar was a special guy. I grew up not liking cats, he changed my opinion. Mr. J had grown up with cats and it was him who wanted kittens when we lived in LA. As we were in an apartment I said yes. Oscar and his sister Ursa, who we lost 4 years ago to the same cancer, marched into our hearts. Knew we would be moving back East yet still adopted the two 4 mo old fuzz balls. We drove cross country with them when we moved back and it was an adventure. And yes both Miss J's knew him and his sister from the start of their lives. It has been the hardest on the younger Miss J. But she went with us yesterday and said it helped her closure. 

Oscar was one of those cats that was more like a dog. He would great us at the door when we came home and was always in our business. And oh my he had a motor on him. You could just look at him and he would start purring. We used to say he was solar charged as when he would lay in a sunbeam he was always purring. He had been on Chemo for 2 years and at the start it was working to keeping him his normal self. But just after his 18th birthday he started to really not rebound from his treatments and we decided to stop. 

As our Vet office is still closed to people they worked with us so that we could still be there through the process. We pulled up in the back of their office and were able to open the back of my car and we all crawled into the trunk with Oscar and were able to spend the whole time with him. And the Dr. and vet tech sat down on the back steps with Oscar in blankets when they administered his end of life care. We have always loved our vet office, but they bent over backwards yesterday to give us the closure wanted. Even had a vet tech who had taken a liking to Oscar make sure he was the one with Oscar the entire time. Even stayed later at work for it. 

We have two more hooligans still in the house. Wes and Millie a pair of crazy tabbies. As of now they do not realize their brother is gone. But he was their gravy train as he ate whenever he asked for it. But the two fatties are going to get a rude surprise of treats being severely limited. But it is for their own good. 

They say things come in 3's so if true we are done with pet deaths this year. Lost both of our budgies (parakeets) this year also. Have always wanted to put Ursa and Oscar together again, and found out that we can. We took in Ursa's urn yesterday with Oscar and their ashes will be combined into one Urn. They should both be home soon. 

Sad day here today. We let our 18 year old cat Oscar run pain free over the Rainbow Bridge. He had been fighting cancer for 2 years. But his body had just had enough. We will miss him so much. He was such a kind gentleman. 

For those starting school today students and teachers, including the two Miss J's...

Change is never easy. Learning new ways to do things is never easy. Embracing both will broaden your horizons. Take a deep breath and jump in. 

Left over pulled pork so did pork tacos with corn relish. And Mr. J shook up one of his special margaritas. 

Had a cell go up to my north came through here with blowing rain and some thunder and lightning. Got .22" in about 5 min as it moved out pretty quick to my south. 

5 star dinner tonight. 
 

Halibut with wine garlic caper sauce, Au Gratin potatoes and fresh broccoli. Absolutely nothing left on anyone’s plate. 
 

So proud of the younger Miss J today. Her and her friends have been doing a zoom of their D&D group. Well today she found out that one of her friends who had said yes to wanting to join was wondering why she was not part of the group. This friend looses her phone and also gets privileges revoked and apparently since she could not reply they cut her out of the group. My daughter felt it was an easy enough fix to allow her friend in, but the others said no as it would be too much work to include her. Needless to say my daughter felt that was not right and withdrew herself from the group. 

We have always taught our girls to be inclusive and to find ways to work things out. I don't know much about the game and while my husband does and said that they would have to work in another character into the campaign that it could be done. I know my daughter would have made it work.  

Spicy pork bowl with Kimchi. 

And I officially have two HS'ers. Schedules just came today. And come spring semester they will actually be in a class together. Into to Ag. Science. 

9 minutes ago, mappy said:

Looks similar to the blocks they have for ours, but its second grade so a bit easier. Just reading/phonics and math. You're lucky that with HS kids they can manage on their own well enough. We won't be able to do that. We will have to stay on top of mini-map. She did class in her playroom in the spring, set up at a desk we got her. But I have a feeling the fall will be her at the dining room table with me. Just to keep her on track. We will see how it goes. We have Wednesdays off, so that will be nice.

Yea I know it is easier for me. Although I will need to stay on top of the newbie HS'er. Was like a fly on a dog pile this past spring with her to make sure stuff was turned in. There was more leaneancy then not so sure about in the fall though. 

Both girls have picked their respective "schooling" zones. They are both actually going to use their school laptops to run through the TV's for a bigger screen for the F2F on Google meets. Then use their personal laptops to do work on. So one will be down on the 3rd level and the other will be on the main level. I told them there is always room for tweaking. 

I really think a lot of families have learned a lot about each other through this process. 

13 minutes ago, mappy said:

On the school front -- we got the kiddo's schedule for the fall. 4-days a week of class from 845-330. Going to be a juggling act but I'm relieved she will have class all day long. It was all of 30 min a day in the spring, so while our days will be hectic at least she is getting that class time she really needs. 

Good luck to all the other parents here, going to take a village to get through this first semester.

We are still waiting on the girls schedules. Both are in HS this year and the sample schedule is as follows. Mind you having HS'ers they are pretty much on their own with this schedule unless they need help from us with anything. Will be interesting as Mr. J is still working from home for the foreseeable future. And both girls will be on video F2F for a decent chunk of the AM. Made sure we were at the top tier for downloads and uploads. 

I do like that they chose to start HS'ers an hour later than normal start time. Now just need to see if in the afternoon they will be required to show that they are logged on in some fashion till the 3:30 time. Or if that last section of time they are on an honor system. 

Did find out that the oldest Miss J will have her dual enrollment class next semester. So we are not on the hook for the tuition till January.