When Your Life Revolves Around the Olympics

I am married to an Olympics junkie.

My husband, Dan, does not sleep for two weeks when the Olympics are on. This winter, he has been watching everything, even the weird stuff.

Curling? Scoot that round stone thing down the ice at painstakingly slow speeds with a broom and stick thingy.

Luge? Who cares if people have died doing this? Go ahead and race down an ice track on your back.

Biathlon? (I know Boise had a local competitor in this event, but . . .) Skiing and shooting? That's just strange, but it does sound like an Idahoan's dream sport.

I came home from a workshop yesterday to find that Dan had been watching the Olympics for eight hours straight.

"I was only going to record the ones I wanted to watch this year, but I ended up recording the whole thing," he said with a sigh.

And when he says "the whole thing," he even means the special interest stories about nesting dolls and the girl who found the Russian parents who gave her up for adoption twenty years ago.

Our decision to watch this Olympics this time around was not without controversy.

"We should boycott these Olympics, considering Putin's human rights record," I mentioned a few weeks ago.

Dan grunted.

So instead of standing strong with Pussy Riot, I've been practicing "twizzles" around the house. (Twizzle is the best word in the world.)

Then, in the midst of my twizzling, Dan saw the pairs skating move where the guy throws the girl sideways above his head and she flips around a couple of times mid-air and he catches her (we hope).

"We should try that!" Dan said, and he chased me around the house until I was able to get into a room with a lockable door.

Of course, the Olympics have reminded us of something that Dan and I don't really want to think about . . . we're not getting any younger. It doesn't help that the commentators keep talking about the mid-thirtyish athletes who are too old for their sports.

Last night, Dan turned off the T.V. and said, "This is the first Olympics where feel like I related to the old guys."

Oh well, I guess you can't dream of someday riding a half pipe in the Olympics forever.

For the latest blog updates, visit and "like" Rebecca Turner-Duggan.

What Was Your Valentine's Reaction?

Roses from my husband, Dan

How did your Valentine's Day go? Are you one of those who professes your undying love for your significant other on Facebook while your significant other sits in the other room? Are you one of those who hates Valentine's Day and goes into anaphylactic shock any time the V-day is mentioned? Are you one of those who shuns Valentine's Day because of the consumerism attached to this made-up-by-greedy-corporations holiday?

Last year, I wrote a blog post about being alright with Valentine's Day. In the past, I didn't care for it that much. I fell into the greedy corporate holiday camp. But then I started teaching and received lots of chocolate from my students.

Of course, Valentine's Day in grade school is different from the secondary level.

One recent post on Facebook read, "In elementary school, everyone was your valentine. Now you have to work for it."

Valentine's Day is still fun for Dan and me because we don't have kids. We can go on a date. In fact, Valentine's fell on a Friday this year making it quite conducive to a date.  

As we were driving to our dinner reservations, Dan and I passed a liquor store. It was busier than usual.

"I wonder if those people are celebrating or mourning," I said to Dan.

"Maybe a little of both."
 
Valentine's Day is still alright with me this year even though it made me feel older.

When I mention that I am an old lady to my students, they protest, "You're not old!"

This has to be a crock because, when I was seven, I thought my thirty-six-year-old teachers were old.

About a week ago, I was at the university, and I realized the college students looked about twelve.

"Becky, we probably looked about twelve back then," a friend from my university days said to me when I mentioned my observation.

I was in this "getting older" mindset on Valentine's Day when our restaurant server brought us the on-the-house-for-Valentine's wine sample. (Dan and I only drink if it's free, a frugal trait I inherited from my father.) No questions asked, no ID involved.

The couple next to us received a complimentary apple juice concoction. They also looked about twelve.

I was again reminded that I am getting older when I couldn't stay up past 9:00 even on a Friday Valentine's date night.

So if I were to respond to the question, "How did your Valentine's Day go?" I would reply with, "Fine. But it's starting to make me feel old."

For the latest blog updates, visit and "like" Rebecca Turner-Duggan.

Snow Day 2014!

Something strange happened on Friday, something almost unheard of in the Boise School District. We got a snow day.

The trick to getting a snow day is the timing. The snow has to dump at exactly the right time late at night or early in the morning, at exactly the time when snowplows are incapable of clearing the roads for the a.m. bus routes. Or it has to be the kind of storm that takes everyone by surprise, the meteorologists, the school officials, the deicer drivers. It must have been the perfect storm on Friday.

On Thursday, I was expecting it to snow more throughout the day. But it didn't snow much at all. I brought home some work, just in case, but I was less than optimistic.

At a meeting that afternoon, one of my colleagues told the rest of the staff, "Do you want to know how to get a snow day tomorrow? Wear your pajamas backwards and flush ice cubes down your toilet. That's what they are doing in New York."

Everyone laughed like it was an inside joke, but I didn't get it at all. Was there supposed to be a logical punchline? Was it one of those sexual references I (sometimes) don't understand?

I laughed anyway.

Then I looked it up online when I got home.

It turns out, lots of snow day superstitions are floating around out there:

• Put a silver spoon under your pillow.
• Turn clockwise twice, then turn counterclockwise twice while wearing pajamas.
• Say "Boom, boom for snow!"
• Put a potato by your alarm clock. 
• Light a green candle.
• Wear your pajamas backwards, and put an ice cube down the toilet for each person living in your house.

I was just relieved that I hadn't missed yet another sexual reference.

Thursday night, I went to bed, certain there was no snow day on the horizon no matter how many spoons I put under my pillow. It hadn't snowed at all for the last several hours. I woke up at 5:30 a.m. and started my morning routine. I was standing naked, just out of the shower, when Dan knocked on the door.

"Snow day!"

"What?" I threw open the door (not in my backwards pajamas, by the way). "Did I get a phone call?"

"No. It's on the news."

"But the school didn't call? Are you sure it's not a hoax?"

Dan pulled out his smartphone.

"It's on the Boise Schools website," and he showed me the message posted in bright red letters.

"What the --" and you can probably guess the rest. I started jumping around (yes, still naked).

Whatever happened in the heavens between the hours of 9:30 p.m. and 5:30 a.m., one thing is for sure . . .

The whole school staff must have worn their pajamas backwards Thursday night.

For the latest blog updates, visit and "like" Rebecca Turner-Duggan.

Top Five Reasons I Was Glad to See the Inversion Go

Ahhhh! Do you feel that? That's the sensation of clean air entering your lungs. Finally. We Boiseans have been living inside a (very large) cloud of polluted, stagnant air for the last week. If you have never lived in a valley where cold air gets trapped by the surrounding mountains, you are missing out on a hiked-five-miles-uphill-in-the-snow story to tell your kids.

Please note: An inversion isn't a delicate frosty fog that leaves everything looking like an icy wonderland in the mornings, although it does make for an interesting view if you can get high enough above it.

Around Thursday, the inversion lifted, and so did everyone's spirits. Here are my top five reasons I was glad to see the inversion go.

1. I can breathe again.
I can go for a walk or a run without feeling like I am wearing one of those Hannibal-style straight jackets.

2. No more crazy kids.
As much as my husband and non-educators scoff at the idea, kids really are affected by lunar cycles and weather abnormalities. On Thursday, my students dialed back the crazy that had been unleashed the past couple of weeks. Or so I thought. By Friday, they were acting weird again.

3. I don't have to brave treacherous mountain roads to get away from it.
Actually my husband, Dan, does the winter mountain driving in this family. But braving the treacherous mountain roads as a passenger is even harder for a control freak like me.

4. No more "sads."
Sigh. It's nice not to have the "sads" anymore because . . .

5. "Here Comes the Sun, do-do-do-do!"
When the inversion lifted, those cold (not polar-vortex-cold though) temperatures un-inverted too. Everything is right with the world. The mountains are a little colder. The valley is a little warmer. And I can see the sun and blue skies. There is something unearthly about not being able to see the sky. And although, Dan and I enjoyed pretending like we were stuck in sci-fi movie for the first day or so, it got old after a while.

Of course, I am realist. I know we have to wait through February until we're in the clear for sure. Then we have a few months before fire season. For now, I am going enjoy the clean air while it lasts.

For the latest blog updates, visit and "like" Rebecca Turner-Duggan.