You may be aware that there’s been a snow event in the
eastern part of the country. The weather guessers in the DC-Maryland-Virginia
(DMV) area gave it the name Snowzilla, with expectations in excess of two feet
of snow, starting on Friday, and winds upwards of 50 MPH. Not a trivial
forecast.
Given that a much lighter snowfall on Wednesday night
caused a complete breakdown in civilization (because the DMV authorities did nothing
to treat highways beforehand, and were limited as to what they could do
afterwards on account of all the stalled and abandoned cars), they screwed
their courage to the sticking place and pretty much told everyone to go home
before the snow started and then stay there, because all public transportation
shut down.
Well, my employer follows the Federal government, which
announced a half-day for Friday, although you could take admin leave or work
from home. Let me just say that you could have held World War III there on
Friday, and no one would have been hurt. There were five people on my floor,
total.
One of my four hardy colleagues was worried about power
staying on at his Chevy Chase house—a very well-to-do suburb. Blizzards are great
levelers; during Snowmageddon a couple of years ago, he and his family ended up
going to a hotel because of power loss. He can’t do it this time because they
now have a dog.
I was a little concerned about power myself, because DC is
famous for sending hundreds of thousands into darkness at the first hint of any
kind of weather event. But as it happens, I spent the weekend in warmth and
light, one of the things for which I am grateful today.
Here are some more:
My commute both to and from work was uneventful. Metro
workers were on the job.
It was a little hairy walking to and from the Metro
stations in the afternoon, because it had been snowing for about 90 minutes and
the wind was pretty fierce.
But once I was home, it was lovely to look at the
snow knowing I didn’t have to deal with it (i.e., shovel it).
By Saturday, some of the drifts were up past my knees when
I went out for a walk. One of my neighbors had initially begun clearing snow
with a tennis racquet—he said that he’d been working every night last week
until 0100, so hadn’t been able to get out to buy a shovel.
According to him, the racquet did an okay job, but then he
noticed someone else seemed to have an extra shovel, so he borrowed it. Good
thing, because he has a corner house.
Another thing I’m grateful for: not having to shovel twice
the sidewalks of a corner house.
There was some road clearing going on up around the
Congressional buildings—I got rather a kick out of this tiny Bobcat whizzing
about. It was small, but it was doing the job.
On Pennsylvania Avenue there were people on snowshoes and a
man pulling a plastic sled with three small children on it.
(About 50 yards up the road he stopped, took a phone call,
and then had the kids get out and walk. I guess enough is enough.)
It was interesting to me that the Chinese restaurant was
open and had cleared the sidewalk in front.
Ditto the Firehook Bakery. (On Sunday one of the FB baristas told me that they'd spent the weekend at the Capitol Hill Hotel around the corner; I guess that's a good blizzard strategy.) Starbucks was also open, but they
only cleared their doorstep, not the sidewalk.
One of the things that made me happiest on my walk was
seeing the complete joy of a flock of birds chowing down at a feeder in someone’s
front yard.
Despite the forecast of snow throughout the weekend, by
Sunday morning it had stopped. Clear sky and sunshine.
Saturday:
Sunday:
I’m hoping that by next weekend I’ll be able to get my car
out from under the snow to continue house hunting. But in the meantime, Metro resumed
service this morning, so I can get to and from work.
And I’m grateful that I made it through the storm with
nothing but a sense of inconvenience.
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