Wednesday, January 28, 2009

Deep Freeze


This is a picture of one of the lights that frames my garage. The past two days have been a weather nightmare. The children were dismissed from school early on Monday because of the pending ice storm and there is no telling when they will return. We won't have temperatures above freezing until tomorrow and who knows how long it will take to melt?

I hate snow/ice days.

The thing that drives me sort of bonkers is the fact that so many businesses are shut down. I went to work yesterday and although the roads were bad, if one went slowly enough, they could be navigated. Last night, it snowed a few inches on top of the ice and this actually helped the driving situation this morning because it allowed for traction. Still, the dry cleaners, bank and most government offices were closed today and it's all just a bit much.

Here in the pseudo south, a dusting of snow is a major calamity so you can just imagine what a blanket of ice does for this community. What has me shaking my head is that we face these conditions EVERY YEAR and our elected leaders still don't purchase the proper equipment to handle these events. Every single year when this kind of storm rolls in, the officials stagger around like they've been punched in the head. Every single year they claim never to have seen anything like it. Whatever.

Of course, I really ought to count my blessings. There are tons of people in my town without electricity. Worse, some have heat but are without internet. I am one of the charmed few. I have both. So as my kids pummel the shit out of each other, I'll be in a steaming hot bath, behind a locked door, watching a movie on my laptop.

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4 comments:

Anonymous said...

I think you got what we just had. Ice everywhere. Not so much fun, but some of it is really pretty from the inside looking out a window.

Holly said...

"Worse, some have heat but are without internet." Bwahaha!

Funny though, even up here, where we have the equipment to handle it, stuff still shuts down.

Call came at 5:30am to cancel school. It hadn't even started snowing yet! By noon, we had only had a couple of inches. They could have had school! Maybe released them early, but had a day that counted none the less!

We've ended up with a little over a foot, with most of it falling mid to late afternoon. But it shut everything down early in the morning, before it even hit. Good grief!

Anonymous said...

I LOVE snow days. Sorry, Beth, but as a teacher, there is simply nothing better to receive that blessed phone call just as you're about to get dressed for work that lets you know that you can GO BACK TO BED!! Better yet, you get to really be 'off' because it a true gift of time-to do NOTHING because all your stuff is at school!
The only thing that sucks about snow days is when someone else gets one and you don't-this is what happened today. All of the public schools were closed, so Julien had to stay home, while the private school teachers, and parents risked their lives to drive into work and school. NOT FAIR! C'est la vie, n'est-ce pas?

Blog Deleted said...

Hey that one makes me laugh ...since I am in CANADA!

We once had a mayor in Toronto who called in the army for assistance because a storm got so bad! He was mocked mercilessly by the hardy Canadians.

We've been dealing with conditions like that where I live every day since early November. Kenny has had 14 snow days so far!

Sometimes my road and driveway don't get plowed till after 4 pm! Thank God for the internet and satellite TV and XBox 360 and hot baths and a well-stocked pantry!

Beth, I know you used to live in London if I recall correctly, part of Ontario's infamous "snow belt" and well, I can surely see why all this inability to handle some adverse weather would "chap your ass" as you like to say!

Hang in there!

xoR