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Stop Me If You've Heard This One Before
Jan. 10th, 2007 09:56 pmThis past November spawned a monster, in the form of a big huge dump of snow. For some reason the heavy snow months last year were March and November. The poor little evergreen sapling we planted in the front yard in the spring(?) is now pretty much completely buried. Let's hope that they're used to that sort of thing. Otherwise we'll have to get a taller one next time.
I mention it because today, after a couple of weeks of moderate temperatures and little snow, with the streets starting to actually become clear again, it was cold, windy and snowy again. There were several inches of snow to shovel this morning, but it was still so windy that when I shoveled snow onto the yard(which is a few feet deep by now)half of it blew away before it landed. The snow brush seemed to have disappeared, so I had to borrow the one from the other vehicle(the car, as opposed to the Jeep which I drive), and then remember to leave it behind.
It took me about an hour and a half to get to work, which is an hour longer than usual. Part of that was, I'm sure, because of the poor visibility due to blowing snow, and part of it due to the bad road conditions, but apparently a lot of it was due to the stalled car blocking one lane on 50th Street. It took me close to forty minutes of creeping along at 10 km/h before we actually reached said car, and after that things sped up for a while. This winter I've finally figured out how to shift the Jeep into four-wheel drive, which has come in handy several times already.
Luckily I've got lots of vacation time accumulated by now, and I've decided to start burning off some of it in the form of short days--in particular, short days when I arrive late because of bad weather and don't want to get home later still trying to stay late to make up that time and falling afoul of the same weather conditions. It worked pretty well today; by the time traffic started picking up at 4:30, I was already most of the way home.
It's supposed to go down to -30 °C tomorrow. No snow, and clear skies, which of course contributes to the cold at this time of year, and for all I know it'll still be windy. It's Simon's half-day at school, so we'll probably just keep him home. The bus was late bringing him home today, and poor Luke almost froze standing with Nicole at the bus stop. It's not worth it going through that again for a lousy half-day.
If the weather gets that bad again, I may just stay home. But as I was inching up 50th Street this morning, huge icicles growing from my windshield wipers as melted snow refroze onto them, and thus the area of the windshield they managed to clear getting narrower and narrower, I was encouraged by the fact that at the other end awaited heated underground parking. All that snow and ice was going to melt off again before I had to leave to go home. Other offices I've worked at, with outside parking, sometimes the ice on the windshield could stay on there for months. I also learned that turning your wipers up to the highest speed can sometimes shake that ice loose, a useful tip for future reference.
Is it too early to be tired of winter?
I mention it because today, after a couple of weeks of moderate temperatures and little snow, with the streets starting to actually become clear again, it was cold, windy and snowy again. There were several inches of snow to shovel this morning, but it was still so windy that when I shoveled snow onto the yard(which is a few feet deep by now)half of it blew away before it landed. The snow brush seemed to have disappeared, so I had to borrow the one from the other vehicle(the car, as opposed to the Jeep which I drive), and then remember to leave it behind.
It took me about an hour and a half to get to work, which is an hour longer than usual. Part of that was, I'm sure, because of the poor visibility due to blowing snow, and part of it due to the bad road conditions, but apparently a lot of it was due to the stalled car blocking one lane on 50th Street. It took me close to forty minutes of creeping along at 10 km/h before we actually reached said car, and after that things sped up for a while. This winter I've finally figured out how to shift the Jeep into four-wheel drive, which has come in handy several times already.
Luckily I've got lots of vacation time accumulated by now, and I've decided to start burning off some of it in the form of short days--in particular, short days when I arrive late because of bad weather and don't want to get home later still trying to stay late to make up that time and falling afoul of the same weather conditions. It worked pretty well today; by the time traffic started picking up at 4:30, I was already most of the way home.
It's supposed to go down to -30 °C tomorrow. No snow, and clear skies, which of course contributes to the cold at this time of year, and for all I know it'll still be windy. It's Simon's half-day at school, so we'll probably just keep him home. The bus was late bringing him home today, and poor Luke almost froze standing with Nicole at the bus stop. It's not worth it going through that again for a lousy half-day.
If the weather gets that bad again, I may just stay home. But as I was inching up 50th Street this morning, huge icicles growing from my windshield wipers as melted snow refroze onto them, and thus the area of the windshield they managed to clear getting narrower and narrower, I was encouraged by the fact that at the other end awaited heated underground parking. All that snow and ice was going to melt off again before I had to leave to go home. Other offices I've worked at, with outside parking, sometimes the ice on the windshield could stay on there for months. I also learned that turning your wipers up to the highest speed can sometimes shake that ice loose, a useful tip for future reference.
Is it too early to be tired of winter?
