Twenty minutes to midnight on 12/31/08, and I'm bailing because I'm cold, exhausted, and cold.
Time to pull my pants up to my nipples and move to Florida.
Farewell, 2008. You kinda sucked.
Onward and upward!
Wednesday, December 31, 2008
Friday, December 19, 2008
Snow, Christmas, and Metallica
First of all, I apologize to anyone (all three of you) who might accidentally stop by this place looking for new content. This was another of my regular "dry spots", blog-wise, and I hope to get back on track in the coming days. No excuses this time around - mostly laziness, I guess. In my defense, though, I did change the layout of sonicplague.com, which I think is more user-friendly (especially the left-side links) and considerably less hideous than its predecessors. Not that I'll stop tinkering with it, though. And I'll probably screw it all up again, of course. Enjoy it while it lasts.
***
We were expecting some snow today, and we weren't disappointed. It started to fall at about 9:30 this morning, as I was headed up the street to the post office (which was a complete zoo, by the way). The ground was completely dry when I stepped outside my apartment, with a few flakes (big, fluffy ones) fluttering slowly to the ground. By the time I was finished waiting in line and started walking back to the apartment, the snow was sticking and the roads, sidewalks, and lawns were dusted. By the time I actually got back to my place (at about 10:15), it was pretty rough.
I've seen worse, of course, having grown up in Massachusetts. Last winter was pretty mild here, though, and the previous couple of winters were spent in Portland, Oregon, where snow is very rare (but enough to shut the city down for days on end). Though we only got maybe four or five inches in the end, this was probably the heaviest snowfall I've experienced in the last five years or so, so it was practically a new experience to me again.
One of the nice things about living in an apartment and not owning a home is that there's a grounds crew to (allegedly) take care of shoveling. Unfortunately, we didn't get any help until well after the snow stopped falling, so walking Joey was a bit of a treacherous endeavor ... but not nearly as treacherous as what Nicole had to go through.
Keep in mind that she works a little more than six miles away from the apartment, and on a normal day the drive is maybe 20 minutes, depending on traffic. She knew, via e-mail from her supervisor, that she could work from home if the weather was bad today, but when she left this morning at about 7 (as she does every day) the only noticeable weather condition was the cold temperature. She figured she'd go in for a couple of hours, then head home when the weather turned.
So I got home from the post office, and gave her a call to give her a head's-up that it was getting nasty out there. When she answered, she was in the Target parking lot, as she wanted to grab a couple of things before coming home. See you in half an hour, she said. I was going to walk Joey, I told her, and if she beat me home I'd be there soon. As Joey and I made our way through the neighborhood, the big fluffy flakes turned into small frozen darts, and the wind started picking up a bit.
Again, this was sometime between 10:15 and 10:30. Joey and I came back from our brisk and semi-slippery walk a little after 11. A little later, Nicole called my cell and said she was trying to get home but the weather was "terrifying", and she'd be at least another hour. Something else to keep in mind: we drive a normal, human sized automobile - a Mazda 3. Unlike, roughly, EVERYONE ELSE in this state, we don't have four wheel drive SUV to cart us around. We have a little, two-to-four person-friendly, mileage-happy little hatchback.
In the space of that hour, the storm took a dramatic turn for the worse, and there was not a plow to be seen. I spent a good amount of time looking out the window, fretting about the conditions, and wishing she could magically beam back to the apartment, Star Trek-style.
By the time she got through the door, we had a couple of inches of snow and it hadn't slowed up at all. She looked exhausted and worn out, and I was finally able to relax, knowing that she was home safely. We were both stressed out.
I've never really had to drive in the snow (always took the T in Boston, always walked or took the Max in PDX), so I don't know what it was like for her, but it couldn't have been fun and I didn't envy anyone caught off-guard by the fast-moving storm.
On the plus side, we were able to kick back and watch "The Thing" and a few episodes of "30 Rock" to kick off the weekend (via the greatest bit of technology to come into my life in the past couple of years: Netflix streaming on X-Box 360. Simply a remarkable service offered at no additional cost by two companies I already love.)
On the downside, though, is the timing of this weather pattern. Our plan was to head to Massachusetts on Saturday morning to visit my family for a couple of days, then to spend a couple of days at Nicole's parents' place. My mom, though, is still trying to get through cleanup of a messy ice-storm in Worcester, so it's all up in the air.
Long story short, the ice storm knocked her power out for days, and apparently there are still some electrical wires and pieces of tree down throughout her neighborhood. To make things worse, the branches, trunks, and whatever else apparently have to be specially removed (ground up, then ultimately incinerated, if I understand correctly) because parts of the city - including my mom's - are infested with Asian beetles. So she can't just expect the city to remove them the way it normally would.
Though her house itself avoided serious damage (no trees through windows or the roof, for instance), some cables of some sort are hanging perilously low over her driveway, and debris from the infested trees are (conceivably, according to my mom) going to block plows from getting her street cleaned off. Despite the blustery conditions here in New Jersey, Worcester is facing at least twice as much snow.
So who knows ... if we could, in fact, get to Worcester tomorrow, we might not be able to get to her house. And if we did, thanks to cables hanging low, we might not be able to park. And we can't leave the car on the street due to rules about snow parking.
And on top of that, there's another storm coming in on Sunday, too. What we thought would be a week-long "vacation" with family might be a condensed, seemingly non-stop road trip crammed into a couple of days. With the dog in the back seat, at that.
And now, who knows. It's all up in the air. At least we're not flying anywhere.
***
In more trivial news, Metallica.
I still can't believe they put out such an outstanding album, after almost twenty years of disappointment. And not only is the album great, the video for "All Nightmare Long" is a blast (though it has nothing to do with the song itself, which is somewhat distracting if you're trying to "follow along" somehow).
Zombies, Russian scientists, giant robots, and weather-control. Aces.
Further, there's a great entry over at Forgetomori about Tunguska, Russian science experiments, balloon bombs, and some of the other stuff used in the video as they relate to actual historical context. Cool stuff.
And then there's this newly released trailer for Guitar Hero: Metallica, for which I absolutely cannot wait.
Stay safe and warm, everyone!
***
We were expecting some snow today, and we weren't disappointed. It started to fall at about 9:30 this morning, as I was headed up the street to the post office (which was a complete zoo, by the way). The ground was completely dry when I stepped outside my apartment, with a few flakes (big, fluffy ones) fluttering slowly to the ground. By the time I was finished waiting in line and started walking back to the apartment, the snow was sticking and the roads, sidewalks, and lawns were dusted. By the time I actually got back to my place (at about 10:15), it was pretty rough.
I've seen worse, of course, having grown up in Massachusetts. Last winter was pretty mild here, though, and the previous couple of winters were spent in Portland, Oregon, where snow is very rare (but enough to shut the city down for days on end). Though we only got maybe four or five inches in the end, this was probably the heaviest snowfall I've experienced in the last five years or so, so it was practically a new experience to me again.
One of the nice things about living in an apartment and not owning a home is that there's a grounds crew to (allegedly) take care of shoveling. Unfortunately, we didn't get any help until well after the snow stopped falling, so walking Joey was a bit of a treacherous endeavor ... but not nearly as treacherous as what Nicole had to go through.
Keep in mind that she works a little more than six miles away from the apartment, and on a normal day the drive is maybe 20 minutes, depending on traffic. She knew, via e-mail from her supervisor, that she could work from home if the weather was bad today, but when she left this morning at about 7 (as she does every day) the only noticeable weather condition was the cold temperature. She figured she'd go in for a couple of hours, then head home when the weather turned.
So I got home from the post office, and gave her a call to give her a head's-up that it was getting nasty out there. When she answered, she was in the Target parking lot, as she wanted to grab a couple of things before coming home. See you in half an hour, she said. I was going to walk Joey, I told her, and if she beat me home I'd be there soon. As Joey and I made our way through the neighborhood, the big fluffy flakes turned into small frozen darts, and the wind started picking up a bit.
Again, this was sometime between 10:15 and 10:30. Joey and I came back from our brisk and semi-slippery walk a little after 11. A little later, Nicole called my cell and said she was trying to get home but the weather was "terrifying", and she'd be at least another hour. Something else to keep in mind: we drive a normal, human sized automobile - a Mazda 3. Unlike, roughly, EVERYONE ELSE in this state, we don't have four wheel drive SUV to cart us around. We have a little, two-to-four person-friendly, mileage-happy little hatchback.
In the space of that hour, the storm took a dramatic turn for the worse, and there was not a plow to be seen. I spent a good amount of time looking out the window, fretting about the conditions, and wishing she could magically beam back to the apartment, Star Trek-style.
By the time she got through the door, we had a couple of inches of snow and it hadn't slowed up at all. She looked exhausted and worn out, and I was finally able to relax, knowing that she was home safely. We were both stressed out.
I've never really had to drive in the snow (always took the T in Boston, always walked or took the Max in PDX), so I don't know what it was like for her, but it couldn't have been fun and I didn't envy anyone caught off-guard by the fast-moving storm.
On the plus side, we were able to kick back and watch "The Thing" and a few episodes of "30 Rock" to kick off the weekend (via the greatest bit of technology to come into my life in the past couple of years: Netflix streaming on X-Box 360. Simply a remarkable service offered at no additional cost by two companies I already love.)
On the downside, though, is the timing of this weather pattern. Our plan was to head to Massachusetts on Saturday morning to visit my family for a couple of days, then to spend a couple of days at Nicole's parents' place. My mom, though, is still trying to get through cleanup of a messy ice-storm in Worcester, so it's all up in the air.
Long story short, the ice storm knocked her power out for days, and apparently there are still some electrical wires and pieces of tree down throughout her neighborhood. To make things worse, the branches, trunks, and whatever else apparently have to be specially removed (ground up, then ultimately incinerated, if I understand correctly) because parts of the city - including my mom's - are infested with Asian beetles. So she can't just expect the city to remove them the way it normally would.
Though her house itself avoided serious damage (no trees through windows or the roof, for instance), some cables of some sort are hanging perilously low over her driveway, and debris from the infested trees are (conceivably, according to my mom) going to block plows from getting her street cleaned off. Despite the blustery conditions here in New Jersey, Worcester is facing at least twice as much snow.
So who knows ... if we could, in fact, get to Worcester tomorrow, we might not be able to get to her house. And if we did, thanks to cables hanging low, we might not be able to park. And we can't leave the car on the street due to rules about snow parking.
And on top of that, there's another storm coming in on Sunday, too. What we thought would be a week-long "vacation" with family might be a condensed, seemingly non-stop road trip crammed into a couple of days. With the dog in the back seat, at that.
And now, who knows. It's all up in the air. At least we're not flying anywhere.
***
In more trivial news, Metallica.
I still can't believe they put out such an outstanding album, after almost twenty years of disappointment. And not only is the album great, the video for "All Nightmare Long" is a blast (though it has nothing to do with the song itself, which is somewhat distracting if you're trying to "follow along" somehow).
Zombies, Russian scientists, giant robots, and weather-control. Aces.
Further, there's a great entry over at Forgetomori about Tunguska, Russian science experiments, balloon bombs, and some of the other stuff used in the video as they relate to actual historical context. Cool stuff.
And then there's this newly released trailer for Guitar Hero: Metallica, for which I absolutely cannot wait.
Stay safe and warm, everyone!