Well? Are we gonna get it? Or not?
Lotsa hype goin’ on around here. I woke up *yesterday* morning and checked the weather on my phone. Like I always do. I need to know how many layers to put on before I venture out into the cold and the dark. There is no such thing as bad weather. You just have to dress for it. Roight? Anyway. ALERT! ALERT! ALERT! What the heck? I thought it was gonna be sunny and, if not warm, at least dry that day (yesterday). And so it was. In fact it was soooo brilliantly sunny that some people got headaches from all that sun. (No, not me. I get a headache about once every 18 months.) That was Sunday. The ALERT was for TUESDAY NIGHT through Wednesday night. I know that weather forecasting has become more sophisticated in recent years but I still can’t figure how they can predict 16 inches of snow (or whatever they said) THREE DAYS ahead! The Planet Ann Arbor has apparently taken the predictions seriously. They have already canceled trash/recycle pickup for Wednesday.
So, I dunno what we’ll get. Maybe I’ll get my exercise shoveling on Wednesday morning instead of walking. Or not? If we really do get 16 inches (or anything much more than about eight), I will not be driving to work. We do not have the loverly old vee-hickle in the photooooos any more, aka The Indefatigable. And if we did, we would be fighting over who would get to use it to get to work. Roight. Actually, my work team has already discussed the possibility of working from home on Wednesday. Well, except for W3.0 who is off on some fun little boondoggle out in the southwest this week. We are the so-called “geriatric team” and we are skeptical about the forecast. But who knows? My cube neighbor once got stuck AT WORK for THREE DAYS! I think I would start walking after about the first night. It’s only eight miles to my house, after all.
If we do get enough snow that we are stuck in our neighborhood, we are pretty well set. I *can* work from home and I can walk (or ski) to the Plum Market to get food. That is, if enough Plum Market employees can get to work… And I think Knight’s has a generator. And I theeeenk that some of those folks live next door to the restaurant… I would not be a terribly happy camper if we lost power. I mean, we can heat the back room with the faaarrrrplace and we have a gas-powered water heater, so I could still take showers, but what’ll we do when our phones/iPads run out of power. I guess we would have to go out in the driveway and faarrrr up our vee-hickles to get to the Internet. Where there’s a will, there’s a way, and I filled up the Dogha today.
The photooos of the old Indefatigable are from New Year’s Day 2008 and that’s Elizilla driving in the second one. I forget how much snow we got that time but she was home from Callyforny and had places to go and friends to see and the jeep was the only vee-hickle that would make it out of our neighborhood that day. We bought that loverly old vee-hickle in 1992 and it is the one my girls (and a whole lotta other kids, cuzzints and friends) learned how to drive. On an old abandoned air base in the Yooperland when they were well below legal driving age. Think eight or ten. Whenever their feet could reach the gas, brake, and clutch pedals. But that’d be a whole ‘nother entry or two or ten.
I wonder how much snow we’ll get in the next couple days? Anyone know? 😉
January 31st, 2011 at 9:00 pm
OK, I wimped out today. I bailed at noon. I should have feigned something, but I didn’t. Better yet, I should have stuck it out. So far it is No-SnowMyGod. Even so, the governor has mobilized the National Guard and channel 4 has gone into Storm Mode, whatever that means. It does look as though Cham-bama and Chicago-land will take it on the chin. I’d wish Val good luck, but what I really wish is that she would stay put. Your flight will be cancelled. I’ll bet you the ticket price. Meanwhile Anne and I sit and wait. Will the ice buildup topple our best tree? Will we be without power for days and freeze in the process? Stay tuned, because only time will tell, but certainly not any weather person.
January 31st, 2011 at 9:54 pm
Our supposedly awful winter hasn’t materialized. We had our Big Snow in November and nothing since then. (not crying about that) We have a Jeep! It’s a CJ-7–what was that one? It does quite well in the snow because it’s 4wheel drive, but light with gears. My SUV does great too in 4wheel with the studless snow tires on, but is HEAVY and doesn’t like to stop on hills. Scary. Hope the forecast is lying, although ours have become increasingly more accurate. We did miss out on that other big storm a few weeks ago though; it missed us by hundreds of miles. Whew! Stay warm!
February 1st, 2011 at 8:27 am
I stopped by Trader Joe’s last night because I needed a few things and was in the neighborhood. virtually all the bread was gone! and several other spots were quite bare. I have never seen anything like that in Ann Arbor. unfortunately I forgot cereal — so I guess I’ll starve.
February 1st, 2011 at 9:22 am
They now seem to be calling for 5-10″ (or 5-12″) and we’ve had that much snow quite a few times before and the city didn’t run out of food or even shut down. So, not sure why people are panicking so much. It’s making *me* feel a little panicky!!! Which is stupid!