Last week, I went to work in a bit of a snowstorm. When I arrived, I garnered a few odd stares when I brought my snow brush in with me.
I patiently explained that “I didn’t want to have to clear off my car to get to the tool I need to clear off my car.”
Everyone thought that was such a great idea. By the end of the day, half of them had asked to borrow my brush. The other half wanted me to clear off their car for them.
It used to be that “no good deed goes unpunished.” Now it includes ideas, too.
J.
(Paul, this might be a good time for you to shut up. Again.)
Update: Alex Nunez’ trackback doesn’t seem to work. Here’s a direct link.
Update 2: Alex fixed his trackback, so kindly ignore the above.
I dunno, Jay. I’d find it pretty easy after the first couple of freeloaders to recommend that they go get their own damn snow brush.
But of course, I’m a selfish bastard, not the kind-heared soul you are.
One of many reasons I love SoCal.
It’s always exciting to see what people here in Missouri will do when clearing their cars. Sometimes it’s the strip, where they clear a single strip in the windows and drive around as though they’re peering through the slot in a snow tank.
The best bad clear job I saw this winter involved someone who didn’t clear off the roof; as that person drove in front of me, the snow slid down the back window and I noticed , as I sat behind it at a stoplight, that the rear window was completely obscured by two inches of snow. The driver didn’t take the chance at the stoplight to clear it, nor did he or she pull into a parking lot to clear it, expecting it to blow away or melt soon enough. Fortunately for me, the car got out of in front of me–by turning onto the entrance ramp for Interstate 270.
Snow?
What’s snow?
I would make a comment about the insanity of living where you have to dig (brush?) out your car when you leave work, but you asked me not to… so I won’t. Nope, not me…
I’ll just go clean the pool instead.
P
Jay,
Did I mention I just used my snowblower for the second time this winter?
Rich
Palmer,Ak.
Back when I lived in the south, I would just use a cassete tape case as my scraper. AFter moving to NH, having a real scraper was a neccessity-although I don’t carry mine inside with me either.
Ain’t it amazing that people who think ahead are ridiculed for doing so?
No good deed goes unpublished.
Rod: how go the earthquakes and mudslides?
Paul: mock all you want. I’ll take a blizzard over a hurricane. Hell, I’ll take two blizzards over a hurricane. It also helps that Manchester, Cow Hampshire is a ways above sea level.
J.
Paul – I have lived through dozens of earthquakes. I have some nice cracks in the walls of my house and in my lanai that indicate they have not done as well as I have. The big one in 53 was very exciting, the 72 quake threw my wife out of bed – I was already up exercising- I pulled off the FWy in 88 or 89 because I thought I had a blowout – then saw 10,000 other cars doing the same thing and said ” Oh just another quake”. In other words you get used to them. My granparents lived in Frisco when the big one hit last century, they were in the lucky 60% that survived the fire. They never last more than a few min and usually only seconds. Believe me I do not get even a little excited any more – but back in 53 wow that was something else!
Well having done both hurricanes in the South and blizzards in NH, I agree with Jay-give me the Blizzards, since they actually know what snow plows are up here and how to use them, once the snow stops, life pretty much gets back to normal, unlike post hurricane, when you have to count the days until the power company decides it is your turn to get your power back, and in the meantime you get to cook over a camp stove and restock your fridge, that is if you still actually have a roof on your house.
Jay, thanks for the direct link. I just fixed the trackback and it looks like it works fine now. I had renamed my post title and that changed the URL that I sent the original trackback ping from. I just renamed it back to the original title and that resolved it.
Sorry. I’m still kind of learning the ropes with some of this stuff.
On topic: I am with Jay in that I would take a blizzard over a hurricane. I was a student at the University of Miami when Andrew hit.
Andrew really, really sucked. I’d rather clear snow off the driveway than spraypaint my insurance policy number on what’s left of the roof of my house.
Well, an April in the Colorado Rockies wouldn’t be an April if it didn’t mean you had to push through and then stand in snow up to your chest just to find the bump that is likely to be your vehicle.
A brush in Colorado is something I use for my hair. Otherwise, it’s shovels on an ordinary day and then you get to deal with the car’s body effects afterward.
I am just someone who likes precipitation. Rain, snow, hurricanes, blizzards, oceans, big ocean waves, all of that, I just really love it all.
I (honestly here) wouldn’t go without my various hurricane experiences, ever, just because they were so fascinating, but if I had to chose between ongoing blizzards as a course of “normal” life events and hurricanes, I’d take blizzards any day. There’s just no comparison.
Plus, I can’t stand high heat and high humidity, which is what you have almost all year round in areas that suffer most hurricanes. I love the ocean, and ocean coasts, so am always conflicted about the two extremes of high altitude living and coastal problems (will never find either better than the other, is what I mean).
The earthquake thing is strange because although affected areas suffer terribly, they are localized. Not like the entire coastal CA gets rattled, is what I mean, when a huge quake affects Northern CA, or even Ventura County…they’re concentrated in small areas while with hurricanes, entire regions are run amok. No comparisons, again, in my experience.
I dunno, I happen to really love snow and blizzards and cold weather and high altitudes, as much as I love the ocean and all the problems that living near it provides. Maybe I should consider Iceland…
S-
Try the Blue Lagoon the next time you visit Iceland. One big lake of a hot tub.
Hope you like grey skies, high winds and bleak volcanic landscapes 🙂