Groundhog Daze

Despite the white-knuckle ride to work this morning, I was kind of glad it was snowing. That meant no sunshine and, especially important today, no shadows.

That's right. Jimmy the Groundhog (Wisconsin's version of Punxsutawney Phil) did not see his shadow! So, if you believe the accuracy of our furry friend as much as our 50-50 forecasters, we are in store for an early spring! After days of doing the "grandma shuffle" across icy parking lots, I for one am looking forward to it.

I have a feeling most people don't care about Groundhog Day. I don't buy into it much myself, but I look forward to when they air Bill Murray's Groundhog movie -- one of my old favorites. In the movie, the main character keeps waking up in Punxsutawney to find that it is Groundhog Day. Again. He is frustrated at first, but then takes advantage of re-living the same day to learn some new skills (mainly to impress a woman) and fix some mistakes (again, mainly to impress a woman).

If you could re-live one day of your life over (and over) again, what would it be? Does one quickly come to mind?

I have a feeling my hubby would re-live a ball tournament weekend from "way back when" when his bat was hot and his glove was golden. I'd probably pick something sentimental like our wedding day but I can't overlook my 35th birthday when we had an awesome time at Mall of America and the Twins game (where I got my picture taken with the mascot!). It was a great weekend and one of the increasingly rare ones where we had all 5 of us together.

I suspect Carter would want to re-live yesterday. Oh sure the pizza party was good and the report card was great, but something even better happened after I blogged...

The doorbell rings at 8 p.m. There stands two of the neighbor girls who are in Carter's class. "We've got to see Carter!" Since one of them was wearing shorts (and a basketball jersey), I urged them to come inside to wait. Suddenly, they are looking towards a car in the driveway and signaling for some other girls to join them.

I go get Carter in the basement and say, "There are 4 6th-grade girls upstairs who want to see you!" I get the old, "Yeah, right." But when he gets upstairs, he is stunned. "Oh my gosh, this is not good," he says, while smiling of course. I swear his face turned as red as his Badgers sweatshirt, but he just kept smiling.

It didn't take them long to state their business. "We want to take you on!" they said. As in they are all on the 6th-grade girls basketball team at Grant and they want to play against the boys team. They were laying down the gauntlet and they're ready to fight!

At first I thought perhaps the girls got wind of the boys' reputation (re: losing record). But then the coach comes in the house (he's the dad of one of the girls) and says, "I just had to meet this Carter kid they're talking about."

As Carter's face turns redder, I suspect perhaps our boy has been talking a little smack at school. I explained to him that if he accepts the challenge, he is accepting on behalf of the team. That -- and the fact that all of these girls are taller than him -- did not deter him. There will be a game in the near future. I am sure of it.

Before the girls left, I offered to take a picture of them in our dining room to prove they were all there. I was half joking but one of the girls said, "I've got a camera on my phone!" Nope, Carter wanted none of that. Though I bet he's kicking himself now. He called one of his teammates later and he didn't believe Carter!

I don't think Carter believed it either. He had a hard time falling asleep last night. He'd alter between, "Man, I can't believe there were 4 girls here to see me" and "We're going to have to kick some butt!"

Perhaps it's just the girl in me, but I don't think those boys stand a chance. Unless, like the movie, they get to keep playing the game over ... and over... and over ... until they win!

Happy Groundhog Day!