is it supposed to be still snowing?

December 6, 2002

The world's loudest snowplow woke me up in the wee hours. I'd only just drifted off moments before because I'd consumed way too much very hot green tea in attempt to soothe my dry and scratchy throat. Well that and the ever present "the doom of InfiniBand is at hand" mental state... but we won't talk about that now... will we? Anyway, between the roar of the engine, the scrape of plow on pavement, and the loud bang when it hit the fence even the world champion soundest sleeper of all time (that would be my brother Donald who could sleep through the end of the world) could not have remained in bed. I'm only imagining that the house shook. Really I am. Since there was only about 2 inches of new snow on the ground, I have no idea what the plow was doing here in the first place. Yes, for once, the Merrimack Valley got less snow than everybody else. It looked like the snow had ended when I watched from the bathroom window as the world's loudest snowplow backed up the entire length of the parking lot and vanished into the night.

Surprise! When morning comes around again at a more civilized hour it's still snowing. This time it's wetter, wet enough for snowmen, and accumulating faster. So when I stopped by Perfecto's for my morning coffee I asked Dave the barista/artist "Is it supposed to be still snowing?" "No," he replies "everybody's been asking that." Since when do I believe the weather forecast? I've lived in New England for my entire 51 years, and I believe guys on TV who say they can predict the weather? What up with that?

Last Wednesday's snow precipitated an encounter with the crazy neighbor (a.k.a. Busy Body) whose madness seems to be activated by snow. The snow started at 6:00 AM and she was out there at the first flake sweeping and shoveling. I kept waiting for her to go back inside her unit so I could clear off my car and move it for the plow but she never did. She was outside sweeping and shoveling for the entire storm. I swear she cleaned it up one flake at a time. So I kind of lost track of time, had finished a leisurely breakfast and was about to take a shower when the plow arrived to clear the parking lot. Oops.

I pulled on jeans and a T-shirt and ran outside without even a jacket or gloves and started frantically sweeping off the car while the plow driver waited and the crazy lady started giving me orders. Then she ordered me to go ring the Russian Parking Space Blockers' Matriarch's doorbell and tell her to get out there. Well, actually I wasn't sure if she was ordering me to get her or the Russian Parking Space Blocker himself in the next unit because she just said "them". I made the mistake of asking which one. Ooops. This activated her belief that I am retarded. I started toward the matriarch's door and she told me no, no, that one... the one I was headed for. I did this start stop thing about 3 times as she got more and more exasperated. Finally I got to the matriarch's door and noted that she had obviously slept late and dallied about getting dressed because she was just pulling on her jeans. Aieeee!

Shivering in my T-shirt I did a piss poor job of cleaning off the car and backed up into a parking spot on the other side of the lot where the plow had already done his thing. I ran back into the house, slid on a sweatshirt and jacket over my T-shirt, grabbed my binoculars and birding accessories, ran back to the car, and jumped in. I quickly pulled out while the crazy lady was distracted pounding on the window of the Russian matriarch's car and yelling at her. I stayed gone the rest of the day searching fruitlessly for snow buntings at every place where I thought they might be.

Fortunately, I was long gone this morning by the time the plow would have come to clear the parking lot thus avoiding another encounter with the crazy lady. I was a little surprised when I got home tonight that the parking lot hadn't been cleared. My parking space was half ice. The crazy lady's space was, of course, pristine pavement because she had cleared and swept it herself.

And y'know, it's not even officially winter yet.

Today's Reading
Modern Japanese Diaries by Donald Keene

This Year's Reading
2002 Book List