Scary Noises and We're Out of Bread

On Monday the kids went to school and Myles went to work. I was alone in the house for the first time in nearly a month! I was happily getting stuff done around the house, and Brad Paisley was singing to me (through Itunes, but still). I was cleaning away and the washing machine was going and the music was on when I heard a noise. I couldn't tell what it was or where exactly it came from. I was upstairs and it was definitely coming from downstairs, near the bathroom where the washing machine is. That is also right by the front door which I of course, have locked. There is a big iron fence around our landlord's property. It goes around both of the houses and you have to have a key to get in. So I could not imagine that someone could have gotten in the house, but I kept hearing this noise.

I called out, "Hello?" No answer. So I slowly head down the stairs. I had my cell phone in my pocket. I'm not sure who I thought I was going to call with it, but I had it. For emergencies here you call 997 for police, 998 for fire and 999 for ambulance. Is there any chance of me keeping that straight in the face of a real emergency? No way. Basia (our neighbor) taught me how to pronounce the name of our street a couple of months ago. So I was armed with that information and my cell phone as I continued down the stairs. Now I looked in all of the rooms. Nothing was out of the ordinary. I looked out the windows. Everything looked secure.

I finally opened the front door just in time to see a big batch of snow slide from the roof onto the metal railing, causing my mystery noise. It had been sliding down the roof and hitting the metal railings on the balconies and by the front door. It has been above freezing several days this week so the melting of the crazy amounts of snow has begun. So the question is: Is the continuation of the (hopefully) Spring Thaw worth the scare it caused on Monday? Yep. Bring it on! And sooner rather than later, please.

The temperatures have reached above 32 several days this week. While this is a great step in the right direction, it still is dipping below 32 at night, causing the melted snow to refreeze into ice. It was so icy this morning on the sidewalks that Myles took a taxi to work instead of walking to the tram. Trey and I went to the grocery store late this morning. It was pretty slushy and not too bad, but there certainly were icy spots. I was carrying the grocery bag and Trey was carrying our loaf of bread home. When we were about 1/2 block from our house I stepped on a patch of ice. I said to Trey, "Be careful. There is ice right here." The words were barely out of my mouth when he lost his footing and slipped, landing on his rear end. He is absolutely fine, but the end of the bread bag ruptured in the fall and our entire loaf of bread landed in the icy, mucky mess sans wrapper. It is supposed to get up to 41 degrees tomorrow. We'll pick up another loaf of bread then! In the meantime, the birds of Gdansk enjoyed an unexpected treat courtesy of Trey's ice mishap.