Snowpocalypse

Thought I'd come up for air before midterms hit next week.

DC got hit by "the storm of the century" a couple weeks ago (it has also been called Snowmageddon and Snobama). It was the most hyped-up storm I've ever seen, but it actually ended up living up to all the hype. And I've got documentation! It literally paralyzed the entire area. School was cancelled for a full week , church was cancelled two weeks in a row, huge trees were falling down all over the place, over 200,000 people lost power, and some days I didn't even leave my house. And I'm from IDAHO. I have to say, even coming from the good ol' Rockies, this was a pretty fantastic series of storms. Check out this progression...

Friday afternoon:

Saturday morning:

Saturday evening. Anybody seen my car?

Some people said it was like I had an extra spring break, which is not quite right. Not just because it's the dead of winter. Class was cancelled one day at a time, so I still spent the bulk of my days doing homework and shoveling, just in case the folks at AU decided the roads weren't really all that bad and class should take place. Every night I'd anxiously await my AU class cancellation text update for the following day...then like Pavlov's dog, I'd start jumping up and down in celebration every time it came.

How I love snow. Cold is so much more bearable when it's accompanied by snowfall. I waited almost five years for a winter like this in DC.

When I'd get cabin fever, I'd go out to play and try to dig a path out of our house. Not like we had anywhere to go, I just wanted to be out in all the beautiful whiteness.

The world just seems so fresh and peaceful when it's all covered by 23 inches of snow.

I also went out for a stroll a few times. I just loved being outside! I took a walk to David's one day and captured these beauties.

Marcia and I had our playtime out there, too.

We were solicited by some friends of ours to come over for dinner and Rock Band on the night of Snowpocalypse. How do you say no to that? Sometimes the sidewalks were nonexistent, but no matter, the roads weren't being used either.

This is King Street, one of the main busy streets by my house. See the other pedestrians up there who also opted for the street instead of carving their way down the sidewalk?

I must spend just a moment defending DC, because this is something I just didn't understand when I moved out here. I've seen plenty of crazy bad snowstorms in my day, where the next day life went on as normal. School was rarely cancelled for weather, especially if you were in college. So why does DC literally shut down every time we get a little flurry? It took me a few winters to understand that they're not just all a bunch of sissies. #1 - Since it doesn't come down like this on any kind of a regular basis, they're just not equipped with all the snowplows needed to take care of anything of this magnitude. So...everybody panics leading up to the storm and cancels everything based on the predictions alone. It also takes them a LOT longer to clear off all the roads (lots of roads, by the way) with what they've got. #2 - Black ice. That ol' DC humidity wreaks havoc on the roads, I tell you. So next time you're tempted to scoff at DC's wimpy reaction to a storm, be gentle. That being said, I can't resist poking fun at a DC-ism that has always made me giggle.

Honestly now, is it going to make things better to put the wipers up when you're up against Snowpocalypse?