Ice, Ice Baby

Over the weekend this area got its first significant snow of the season and the main thing I took away from the storm was the fact that during the last few months many people forgot just how winter works. The most annoying was, of course, the meteorologists. Apparently a summer where days routinely got into the 90s made them forget how to forecast when the temperatures get cold again. I never expect accuracy in these situations but I have to say that even by those low standards this was not their finest hour. Initially they were all over the place when predicting how much snow we would get (starting off with well over a foot and then slowly backing away from that total) and then they couldn't even narrow down a timeline to let us know when snow would be the heaviest. That is why after being told that my town would get somewhere between 3 and 8 inches of snow I was not surprised to wake up and find roughly four inches of snow on the ground. (I half expected not to have any.) But it wasn't even the amount which got me about this storm, it was how heavy it was. In my opinion this is the worst kind of winter storm - it starts out as snow and then changes to rain before the temperature plummets, the result of which is the snow gets a thin icy coating and has the weight of a dying sun. I would rather have a foot of light snow than three inches of this stuff but unfortunately I don't get a vote. Still, this is when meteorologists are supposed to shine so you would think they would spend the rest of the year getting ready for this season. I can only assume that instead they spent the last nine months trying to get transferred to a station in San Diego.

Of course, it is not like the rest of us did much better. Normally the Masshole in me is able to burst with pride as the residents of my state never get too flustered by a little snow but the level of chaos in the stores and on the roads on Saturday morning would have made you believe that stores fly south for the winter. I had to wait in line for gas for a solid fifteen minutes (and this was after going to one gas station and discovering they were out of regular and super grades) and nearly saw three accidents during that time because people were so determined not to let another car get in front of them. The stores were even worse because while people weren't going crazy hoarding food they were in a frenzy to try and get their holiday shopping done because there are only so many more weekend days before Christmas and nobody was sure what shape the roads would be in on Sunday. So, you could get bread if you needed it but if you were waiting until today to get the last few items on your gift list you may be out of luck. And this kind of holiday hustle wasn't even relegated to the traditional stores. I went to go get a Christmas tree on Saturday and discovered that by waiting until after noon I had missed out on the huge rush but also the pick of the litter. Many of the stalls were empty and the trees which were left had just come off the truck, meaning they were still compressed and frozen into treesicle form. Sure, a couple of them looked as though they would eventually defrost into something worth decorating but how can you know in that situation? Ultimately I had to pass and opt to wait to get my tree until later this week when the days are supposed to be a little warmer.

The good news is that even though the meteorologists forgot how cold fronts react when they hit precipitation, shoppers didn't have a contingency plan for weather and young drivers are still figuring out that you have to turn into skids, there is one winter technique that Massachusetts residents are always ready to fall back (probably because it is engrained in our DNA) - the slippery shuffle. For those warm-weather readers, the slippery shuffle is that gait people who live in cold-weather cities automatically adopt whenever there is ice on the ground. The second there is a hint the slippery stuff could be in the area we start shortening our steps and making sure our feet are never more than two inches off the ground because if your plant leg starts to slide out from underneath you the last thing you want is your other leg to be too high in the air to instantly correct the situation by providing additional support. The result is that you don't really walk, you shuffle along - hence the name. I have seen kids as young as two instinctively start walking this way at the first sign of trouble (though it probably helps that they just learned to walk and don't trust their balance yet anyway) and I am convinced that retirees in Florida walk this way because they have brought this move with them, just in case. In some ways the slippery shuffle is the great equalizer because it doesn't matter if you are 3, 33 or 93, everyone now moves at the same pace. Simple tasks like going to check the mail, which should take two minutes, now take closer to ten because you move so slowly. It's frustrating but better than falling every seven steps.

Sadly the way this storm came through - wavering back and forth between snow and rain with temperatures plummeting right as the storm was ending - was perfect for creating a sheet of ice on just about every surface. Unless they shoveled at exactly the right time (and it doesn't appear anyone did) all anyone managed to do was get rid of the top layer of snow and leave a coating slush hanging around. That always happens when you shovel but since it is impossible to get a dry surface when you are shoveling slush as soon as the cold came whipping back around it all froze in whatever shape it had taken. (For example, I have boot prints in the frozen slush on my driveway which nearly two days later couldn't be more perfect if I had molded them in concrete like outside Mann's Chinese Theater in Hollywood.) The only good news is that I am hardly alone in my piss-poor snow-clearing skills and that means everyone is moving at half-speed because no one wants to end up in the emergency room with a broken arm a week before Christmas. It is something of a bonding experience and we will probably be walking this way until we get a couple days in a row when it is above freezing during the four hours that the sun is out. Looking at the weather reports (which, I am choosing to believe despite all the evidence that I shouldn't) it doesn't look like that will be happening for a few days so in the meantime we will all be enjoying this intensive refresher course in how to act during the winter months. In the end that is probably a good thing because something tells me we are going to be going through this again at roughly the same time next year.