It was not until Sunday evening that power was eventually restored to the portion of Columbia Falls. In the time leading up to then, Molly and I had finished shoveling our driveway and the various road construction groups had managed to get the bulk of the roads plowed away. In some places where wind had been able to blow the snow, that work didn't seem to bad, but considering the depths of the snow that it had been in in areas where something either prevented the wind from blowing it somewhere else or where it was sheltered the drifts were fairly deep. The men driving the plows probably had to be very careful in those areas.
Through the weekend, Molly and I largely depended on wristwatches that we owned, the cell-phone that technically belonged to both of us, and the one or two clocks that we had that were battery powered rather then dependent on the main power grid. The numbers on the wristwatches were fairly small on them in comparison to the other clocks that we could use, but the still kept time, and it wasn't like our eyes couldn't read the details on the watches.
All the same, the restoration of electric power on Sunday evening was a good thing. The next morning would be a school day and so far it looked as though the kids would return to school in the morning. We would need our alarm clock, which was run on electricity from a socket near where Molly and I had our bed, to be working. The cell-phone we owned came with its own alarm and could do okay in place of the alarm clock, but its volume was much weaker the alarm clocks, and I didn't want to gamble on it waking Molly and I up after four days where we hadn't had to get up for work, thanks to the blizzard.
The power came back on while Molly and I were eating dinner that Sunday evening. There was a soft "ho-hummm" type noise as power was restored and the electrical appliances that were always running came back on. The noise was enough to let us now that we had power again.
"The power's back," I commented, stating the obvious.
"Good to hear," Molly replied.
"The hum of the power coming on or my statement?" I asked.
"I'll leave you to figure that out," Molly smiled.
"Figures," I shook my head and sighed softly, "Guess we can start putting things back and setting clocks... and maybe we could catch the news... see if they're reviewing anything."
Molly nodded and we both resumed eating our dinner. Our eyesight was good enough in low light that we didn't need to turn lights on. Once that was done, we began putting things back as they were before the power went out. The food that we had put in the garage to keep cool was moved back to the refrigerator. We'd found that nothing went bad in the garage. While I was busy with that, Molly took one wristwatch that she owned and began resetting the clocks that had gone off when the power went out. As I finished putting the food away and began to move to the living room, I ran into Molly coming down the stairs.
"Clocks or set and the bathroom light was turned off," Molly announced.
"Huh?" I wondered at the last bit of the announcement.
"I don't think I ever returned the light switch to the "off" position when we learned the power was out," Molly explained.
I nodded and we then proceeded to see if the local news was covering anything on the blizzard. It'd be a sort of aftermath report, by this time, but it would be better then nothing. We were in some luck that they were running an review of what the blizzard had done. And to some extent, that was where the term "good luck" ended. According to the report, the blizzard had dumped about a foot of snow all through the region and was now passing Billings, Montana. Someone driving between Kalispell and Helena had hit some black ice somewhere along the way and rolled... and unfortunately, this was just as the blizzard had hit in full force in that area and the road he was on was about to be closed. Plow crews found the upturned vehicle Saturday afternoon. In addition to this, two men from Blackfeet Indian Reservation were killed due to exposure while trying to tend to their horses and cattle near the town of Babb. And that was merely a review of what had happened in our area.
"We got incredibly lucky," Molly said in a nervous voice.
"Yes, yes we did," I nodded in agreement. We had gotten lucky, all things considered.
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
The next couple of weeks went by relatively calmly. Columbia Falls as still largely digging out from the blizzard in many ways. The snow itself had been fairly easily removed from the streets and such, but there was a lot "catching up" sort of things that went on as people tried to make sure those they didn't see too often were okay. Molly returned from school on Monday with several stories of other teachers asking her if she was okay. In the course of these weeks, Molly also learned that Megan, Veronica, and all the students she had taught the year before and so far this school year had made it through the blizzard alright. That was a good thing. We also learned that Dave's vines also survived the blizzard.
However the blizzard had another major "negative" affect for Officer Barnes and I. The station had managed to function fairly well through the blizzard, but it took a fair amount of coordination. Particularly as the blizzard made a good many streets icy, even in town. Not every street had been closed, but they were still slick. One officer on a very slow patrol had hit a patch of ice on of the streets that was reasonably drivable and went off the road. Thankfully, he slid into a parking lot and ended up with the front of his car buried in a snow drift. The officer had had to walk back to the station and from what I heard from Officer Barnes, looked very blue in the face when he arrived. Because of all the coordination work on his head to cope with the blizzard, Officer Howard had suspended the search for a new DARE and dispatch officer for the rest of the month. That was largely to get things at the station back in order.
And while the blizzard had passed, the air temperatures remained lower then thirty-two degrees Fahrenheit, which meant that nothing was going to be melting anytime soon. And as this went on, several of the symptoms of pregnancy began to get stronger with Molly. Morning sickness was the worst of them. I didn't know if it actually made her throw up, but I could hear her going through several dry heaves in the morning and on the way to work. On one hand, it made me feel glad, as it was a sign that our mating was successful and that Molly was indeed pregnant. On the other hand, the morning sickness could not be fun.
"You're sure you're feeling okay, Molly?" I asked her on a Saturday morning after January 25.
"I'm fine, George, really," Molly answered as she finished one bought of morning sickness before breakfast.
"It doesn't sound fun," I told her.
"It doesn't feel good either," Molly answered, "but all women go through this when pregnant... especially in the early months. Animal Person females too... so unless you want to figure out a way to carry our cubs for me... trust me when I tell you that if something is wrong, I'll let you know."
"Okay then," I sighed, "Just making sure..."
"I know, and I love the fact that you care," Molly replied, "but you don't need to double check every few minutes."
I slowly nodded. I was looking through a local paper that had come in that morning. Even though we had gone almost a month since the blizzard, they were comparing it to many of the other blizzards that had hit the area in previous Januaries. Some of the charts and things were fairly interesting to look at, and combined with what Molly and I had seen of the roads as we walked to to work from our cabin to either the High School or the Elementary School.
"Anyway, I'm going to place the call into the Kalispell Hospital/Clinic to set up an obstetrician appointment today," Molly spoke up after a moment before she came in with what was our breakfast, "I don't think it'll be much, as they won't do that much in the way of care until they can know for sure..."
"So this is to go in for the blood tests to confirm that you're pregnant?" I inquired.
"Yes," Molly nodded.
I glanced at the newspaper again, and then outside. The area around our cabin's front windows presented what could be a very picturesque view of the mountains and the town below us. Covered in snow and all that. It made for a pretty picture, but considering the blizzard that had hit us earlier in the month, and the damage to the general area of the state that it had caused, it reminded me of a couple of other things.
"If they give you a choice of when you can go in, see if you can get it for the coming weekend," I spoke.
"The coming weekend? What about today?" Molly asked.
"If you can get an appointment in today, that would be even better, if not aim for next Saturday," I answered.
"And if I can't get one on a weekend?" Molly asked.
"Let me know what day so I can get the day off," I answered, "I want to come with you."
"They'll probably only be drawing blood for this," Molly spoke, "nothing real big..."
"Yes, I know," I answered, "but remember our issues with transport... right now, while your pregnancy isn't showing, we can still ride in my Ranger's back seat... but it is far too small for us to ride in the way it was designed..."
"I know that," Molly answered, "So you want to go car shopping as part of the appointment?"
"To put it simply, yes," I nodded.
And transport was a major issue. As Molly's medical care increased with her pregnancy, and the fact that the closest place where she could see an obstetrician, getting proper transportation was important. The Ford Ranger I had had before Molly and I were transformed, and still owned but rarely used now, wouldn't be effective. So, Molly and I had begun looking for a new vehicle with the idea of trading my Ranger in for it. At first we had only looked through various used car dealerships in the area, as they would be cheaper and might give me a better price for the mid-sized truck that I owned. The vehicle was in excellent condition and I felt that it was worthy of a good deal. We were originally looking to the idea of a mini-van or an SUV that we could both ride in, and could have Molly's Uncle Frank drive us as necessary.
But in the course of researching the various prices and the other used car dealerships, we had stumbled onto a different sign of progress for Animal People. We had learned that GM was producing a new vehicle they were calling the Furtopia, a greatly enlarged car that would be custom built for each order, depending on the specific species of the Animal Person ordering the vehicle. In addition, through Joseph Patten, Molly had learned that Ford and Toyota were also moving to build vehicles for Animal People whose species was larger then that of humans to a degree that human sized structures and vehicles were too small. Though Ford and Toyota had decided that instead of building a whole new vehicle, they would take the largest full sized vans that they made and enlarged them as necessary. Prices for these vehicles seemed rather expensive, and given the paychecks Molly and I earned, buying one of them would spread things out pretty thin financially. On one level, I wanted to keep our finances flexible enough that we could adapt to things as they happened, but the idea of being able to drive again was great.
And there was also the memory of what had happened in the storm. The man who had died between Kalispell and Helena had been in a Ford Explorer from the 90s. SUVs were great for carrying passengers over rougher terrain then a car or mini-van could handle, but they were notoriously prone to rolling over. And that is what precisely what happened to that drive. And as Molly was likely pregnant, her physical safety even more important. Because she could have as many as four cubs growing inside her. And a good part of me didn't want to run the risk of buying some used car that could potentially go off the road and result in Molly, myself, and likely her Uncle being seriously hurt or even killed. But most of the websites we'd looked at didn't have much technical data beyond the obvious things for these vehicles, including the new ones. That left us one option.
"It may run the risk of getting cheated by a salesman... most of the sites that we've looked at online haven't done much about listing what are the vehicles safety measures to prevent it from rolling over," I answered, "and the people selling the cars might be a bit more knowledgeable."
"Some of it might be in the wheel base," Molly commented, "I looked at something on the Transit... it's a bit wider then the other vehicles they're building for animal people. It'd be pretty tight in some of the more narrow streets in town, but it'd still fit on the highway and in most parking spaces..."
"Ah ha," I nodded, "That might help. It'd be nice to see though what else they've done to try and prevent it... or know how strong their seat belts are, that sort of thing."
"That I couldn't figure out," Molly admitted.
"It's no trouble," I sighed, "as I said, we're to the point where we'll need to talk to a salesman... and if it comes to buying a new vehicle rather then a used one... we may simply have to bite the bullet..."
"And get something like the enlarged Transit or HiAce... or the Furtopia?" Molly wondered.
"I'd be tempted to stick with the Transit option," I commented, "I might get a better trade in deal from a Ford dealer for my Ranger then I would from a GM or Toyota dealer. A lot of it will depend on how safe it is. The last thing I ant is for us to be involved in a roll over accident because of ice while going between here and Kalispell for doctor's appointments."
"The ice will be gone by the time I'm ready to give birth," Molly reminded me.
"I know," I answered, "but it's there now. We've both seen it... and felt it crunch under our paws."
To iterate my point, I reached under the table with one leg and wiggled my toes on top of her foot. Molly looked up at me and then gave a slightly playful smile.
"The snow and ice is not the only thing I've felt playing around my feet," Molly gave a chuckle.