Junior high school and the "cryptic world of frozen death"

Annika and I accompanied Kerstin to Jefferson Middle School this morning -- for her first day in sixth grade.
Kerstin was nervous and excited in equal measure, with a little fear tossed in for added spice.
"I don't know ANYBODY," she gasped when we surveyed the scene at the front steps of the school.
Then, a horde of her classmates from last year spontaneously appeared. Kerstin felt much better after that, and Annika and I trekked back home.
Now, I am preparing for a rare night shift at work while reading about an altogether different trek.
I am reading H. P. Lovecraft's "At the Mountains of Madness," a novella originally presented as a serial in the February, March and April 1936 issues of Astounding Stories.
It concerns a group of Antarctic explorers who discover horrific secrets during an expedition.
I have been reading a collection of Lovecraft tales selected and edited by Joyce Carol Oates. "The Dunwich Horror" and "The Call of Cthulhu" are among my favorites in the anthology. They are best read in daylight. Night-time Lovecraft reading tends to foster the development of vague dreams of surreal fears.
Hey! Just like junior high school!