Tuesday, February 12, 2013

Finding Nemo

Just like many of you this past weekend we were hunkered down because of Blizzard Nemo.  So before I go into my truly unbalanced weekend I must ask this question.  Did I miss the memo on naming of winter storms?  When did this start happening?  Well, apparently The Weather Channel (TWC) went rogue and decided to do this on their own.  That's just great, we give a media outlet that much power.  I guess than it is no different than anything else.  Let's move on.

I think I am the only person that welcomed the "snowmageddon" we got over the weekend.  Between my job, my basketball coaching and basketball officiating this is an extremely busy time of the year for me.  I love what I do, and have no regrets but a break is usually needed and Mother Nature is usually the person who gives it to me.  So when I received word that my basketball duties were cancelled for Friday, I was bummed and relieved, because I will get some long overdue family time.

The beauty of being snowed in for me is that my "honey-do" list indoor edition gets worked on.  On Friday I started the day of with a trip to Home Depot, not to get shovels or ice melt, but to get my honey do supplies.  I went to work and then I took care of the most important thing that was needed for the weekend, wine.  I visited my friends at The Wine Vine on Highland St. in Worcester and I stocked up for the weekend.  Then it was on to family time.  

With my wife coming home early we hunkered in on Friday afternoon and had a really good time.  We played games with our three year old, we watched a Disney movie and did chores around the house.  My daughter was mesmerized by the snow and was getting all geared up to make snow angels and snowmen.  We went cautious with her explaining that there may be too much snow and it wouldn't be possible this weekend.  After a day of constantly just doing things, including getting a workout in, my wife and I sat down and had a bottle of wine and just "chilled".

Saturday morning as the snow continued my wife and I took the task on of teaching our daughter to play Wii Bowling.  It was quite comical but she enjoyed and it kept her out of a TV coma brought on about Disney and Nickelodeon.  I then took to social media and was amazed at the amount of people talking about the same thing, and posting pictures of the snow as if their scenario is any different than anyone else.  I had some fun with it.  After I saw the twentieth picture of someone's snow covered car I went into my garage and took a picture of my wife and my cars and posted them on the internet.

The snow ended and this is where the weekend got a tad frustrating.  I went outside and started to shovel, as you may already know I was stunned at how much I saw.  I usually have my driveway plowed and I shovel the rest.  But when I got there my street had not been touched by city plows and the plow for driveway could not get down the street.  I was ok with it, I figured one would be along soon.  Nope! My neighbors and I decided to take matters into our own hand and clear what we could.  There is a large amount of liability of doing that.  So for a city that fines people for not shoveling their sidewalks within 48 hours has no accountability whatsoever when they just randomly skip a street.  I tried to give them the benefit of the doubt but when 9pm rolled around I was beyond frustrated.  So I took to social media and let everyone know what was going on. 

I could go on and on about how City Government doesn't work and there are too many loopholes and red tape.  It should not take me taking to social media to get action.  I appreciate my friends that helped and offered to help, especially City Councilor Kate Toomey.  This was a big storm and I am sure the city needed all hands on deck and then some.  But when several people call and are inquiring about when their street is going to get plowed they should not be ignored, luckily nothing happened and an emergency vehicle didn't need to get down my street.  Once again the city I live in let me down.

Needless to say, when we finally did get a plow down the street he did a wonderful job.  Even though he had some trouble getting up the road for obvious reasons, he did not plow anybody's driveways in.  Thank you very much for that.  I am done with snow for this year.

3D
If you don't take it from me, ask my wife.

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