A hint of winter

[muckefuck]

We had a trivial amount of snow today. I was in a windowless office during the thick of it and came out to the same weak flurries as yesterday, but judging from what I saw on the walks the flakes were big and fluffy for a while. Actually, the effect was rather odd, the opposite of what the city normally looks like in winter: Enough accumulated to cover the pavements, but too little to top the grass.

I learned from Tom Skilling's blog that it was lake effect snow, and there's more expected tomorrow. He also says that the background conditions have shifted to favour snow for the first time this year. I hope so. Yesterday I was about to check his blog to confirm my suspicions that this has been one of the driest winters on record. You all know me, I worry about the poor little plants, how they dry out without their protective layer of frozen water and what a lack of snowmelt means for the health of the ecosystem.

A more charitable person might put down some the overreactions I saw (e.g. four maintenance men on the CTA plaza, two with shovels and two spreading salt) to trigger-happiness engendered by a lack of action. I think Chicagoans are just morons when it comes to snow removal. Seems like they either do nothing and let the snow get trod down into a sheet of killer ice or they go ballistic with snowblowers and chemical salt when a pushbroom and a few minutes of elbow grease would've down the job just fine.

Comments

[clintswan.livejournal.com]

agreed