I came home last night, ate dinner, and figured I'd help myself out by shoveling the driveway. Moved about four or five inches off the thing and felt damn good about myself. Channel 2 was confidently predicting that my area (lake effect is an strange beast, with small bands of snow fingering out over the area) would get 4-6 more inches by around midnight, at which point the lake effect band would be heading for ski country. That wouldn't take more than an hour to shovel off in the morning so I set my alarm for 5:30 confident that I'd have plenty of time to get to work. Given Channel 2's penchant for predicting SNOWY DOOM every time we are set for even a couple inches of snow, I figured they were erring on the side of ratings-grabbing stupidity as usual.
Bzzzzzt! Wrong.
I popped out of bed into my sweats and skipped out to the garage. Shortly after pressing the door open button I was presented with the Snowpocalypse. A field of white over my knees, the only break in the pristine snow being the two red mirrors sticking out of the snow mound where I could have sworn I'd parked my car the night before. Two feet if it was an inch. What to do, what to do? Start digging.
Still digging. Motherfucking snow. For those of you who have never moved early-season lake effect snow, it is pure hell. It's barely cold enough to be snowing in the first place, but the cold air moves across the warm lake and picks up moisture at an alarming rate. The resulting snow comes in great turds of white, or pellets that are like sandpaper when they get blown into exposed skin, and absolutely refuse to sit still on your shovel. Both of them are crammed absolutely full of barely-frozen moisture. Last night we apparently got a layer of each.
Still digging, except it's started to snow again. First some pellets, then some bigger flakes. I'm out here alone. City of Good Neighbors, my ass.
Still digging, snow shitting down around me. I change my clothes because everything is soaked through. Early-season lake snow behaves suspiciously like rain when it hits a warm body. Pausing to change is a good idea, I think, because it's never a good time to get frostbite on your testicles. I don't want any more kids, but I do enjoy the free supply of testosterone. Call me an addict.
At around hour 3 I made it to the snow plow snow. Huzzah! Then the neighbor from across the street came over with his snow blower. Huzzah! I told you this was the City of Good Neighbors!
Back to digging. It's ten minutes later and my neighbor can't get his blower to bite the snow. It's packed too hard. I thank him for trying.
Still digging. It doesn't seem too bad, that snow blower must be one o' them cheap ferrin jobbies. Here I go, one scoop after the next. Easy-pea... OW OW OW, why is there concrete in the middle of my snowbank? Oh, there isn't, I've just hit the real snow plow snow that the blower couldn't eat. It's neck-high on a fat, six-foot Canadian. By this time my wife is brushing off my car for me under the mistaken impression that I'm almost done. It's OK, she had a ways to go. With all the snow on the roof my Sonata looked like an Econoline van. I head back to the garage to get the spade. The pointy one.
Still digging. Breaking everything apart with the spade, then cleaning up the mess with the snow shovel. I'm a bit of a tank, but I have to back off when I notice the scoop bending under the weight. By this time I'm involuntarily exhaling with each shovel-load, grunting like I'm going all Bruce Lee on this shit. I get to the road. Now I just have to do the other two-thirds of this crap.
Four hours and thirty minutes. Clear to the road. I head in and take a shower. I get dressed, and find that my wife has made me three pieces of rye toast with a big glass of iced tea and some hot chocolate. I down the iced tea and she gets me another glass. It was thirsty work. I plow through the rest of my breakfast and grab my work things. For a moment my groin protests and decides it would like it better if I just lay down on the floor, but the moment passes and I move on.
I get to work and recant my tale. "Why did you even come in", I'm asked.
"Bloody-minded determination", is my response. "I told myself that I was going to shovel out the driveway and then go to work, and come hell or high water that's what I was going to do."
...and so I did.
Bzzzzzt! Wrong.
I popped out of bed into my sweats and skipped out to the garage. Shortly after pressing the door open button I was presented with the Snowpocalypse. A field of white over my knees, the only break in the pristine snow being the two red mirrors sticking out of the snow mound where I could have sworn I'd parked my car the night before. Two feet if it was an inch. What to do, what to do? Start digging.
Still digging. Motherfucking snow. For those of you who have never moved early-season lake effect snow, it is pure hell. It's barely cold enough to be snowing in the first place, but the cold air moves across the warm lake and picks up moisture at an alarming rate. The resulting snow comes in great turds of white, or pellets that are like sandpaper when they get blown into exposed skin, and absolutely refuse to sit still on your shovel. Both of them are crammed absolutely full of barely-frozen moisture. Last night we apparently got a layer of each.
Still digging, except it's started to snow again. First some pellets, then some bigger flakes. I'm out here alone. City of Good Neighbors, my ass.
Still digging, snow shitting down around me. I change my clothes because everything is soaked through. Early-season lake snow behaves suspiciously like rain when it hits a warm body. Pausing to change is a good idea, I think, because it's never a good time to get frostbite on your testicles. I don't want any more kids, but I do enjoy the free supply of testosterone. Call me an addict.
At around hour 3 I made it to the snow plow snow. Huzzah! Then the neighbor from across the street came over with his snow blower. Huzzah! I told you this was the City of Good Neighbors!
Back to digging. It's ten minutes later and my neighbor can't get his blower to bite the snow. It's packed too hard. I thank him for trying.
Still digging. It doesn't seem too bad, that snow blower must be one o' them cheap ferrin jobbies. Here I go, one scoop after the next. Easy-pea... OW OW OW, why is there concrete in the middle of my snowbank? Oh, there isn't, I've just hit the real snow plow snow that the blower couldn't eat. It's neck-high on a fat, six-foot Canadian. By this time my wife is brushing off my car for me under the mistaken impression that I'm almost done. It's OK, she had a ways to go. With all the snow on the roof my Sonata looked like an Econoline van. I head back to the garage to get the spade. The pointy one.
Still digging. Breaking everything apart with the spade, then cleaning up the mess with the snow shovel. I'm a bit of a tank, but I have to back off when I notice the scoop bending under the weight. By this time I'm involuntarily exhaling with each shovel-load, grunting like I'm going all Bruce Lee on this shit. I get to the road. Now I just have to do the other two-thirds of this crap.
Four hours and thirty minutes. Clear to the road. I head in and take a shower. I get dressed, and find that my wife has made me three pieces of rye toast with a big glass of iced tea and some hot chocolate. I down the iced tea and she gets me another glass. It was thirsty work. I plow through the rest of my breakfast and grab my work things. For a moment my groin protests and decides it would like it better if I just lay down on the floor, but the moment passes and I move on.
I get to work and recant my tale. "Why did you even come in", I'm asked.
"Bloody-minded determination", is my response. "I told myself that I was going to shovel out the driveway and then go to work, and come hell or high water that's what I was going to do."
...and so I did.
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