Tuesday, December 8, 2009

Dashing Through the Snow and Cursing Every Second

Photo: A shopper in Kewaskum, Wisconsin, looking for the perfect shovel. Kewaskum could get as much as 20 inches of snow between tonight and 6 a.m. tomorow morning. Photo from the Milwaukee Journal/Sentinel's website, jsonline. Whew! That nasty blizzard is HERE, and right on schedule. Geez, our weather guys with their VIPER Radar or amazingly accurate the past few years. I had cleared to leave the office at 4 p.m. to make sure I was home before the storm started getting serious; it was snowing this morning when I left the house, but nothing out of the ordinary. Later it snowed harder, but then it stopped for most of the afternoon. When I finally left the office at 4:30 p.m., it was 40 degrees F outside! That scared the crap out of me, let me tell you, because temperatures can turn on a dime here and the streets were wet. It wasn't raining or snowing when I walked out of my building downtown, but by the time the bus hit my stop an incredibly speedy 45 minutes later, it was spitting sleet out of the east on a brisk wet wind that went right through me. By the time I did the 8 minute walk (I used to be able to do it in under 6 minutes) from the bus stop to the house, the weather had deteriorated so much I couldn't believe, except I was right out in it while it was happening! I arrived home at 5:35 p.m. and am SO glad I left early. A couple of looks outside since about 5:45 p.m. show some serious whipping snow; the vent in the kitchen for the range hood is clacking (meaning strong winds out of the northeast blowing against the vent guards on the outside). The rest of the house is creaking and groaning under the sudden assault of rapidly dropping temperatures (it will be below zero by tomorrow afternoon) and the strong winds. And - most amazing of all - I hear the sound of salt trucks coming through the subdivision. WOW. They never come through this early. Never! That means this is really serious business. Technically, Milwaukee County is just under a "winter storm warning." Yeah - National Weather Service dudes, you try walking a mile home from the bus stop with sleet and/or blinding snow blowing in your eyes, up your nose, in your mouth and 40 mph winds snatching your breath away, and not call it a blizzard. Ha!

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