Broom waggin’

~ Patrick O'Grady
Just enough snow to break a hip on.
Just enough snow to break a hip on.

Three degrees below zero and another quarter inch of snow. If this is fun, we’re having it.

Corner Mike beat me to the sidewalk-brooming this morning. I call him Corner Mike ’cause (wait for it) he lives on the corner. This helps differentiate him in casual conversation from Alley Mike, who lives — well, you get the picture.

Corner Mike and I are the only guys on this side of the street who are under 75, so we tag team  snow removal. As a part-time rumormonger I have more spare time than Corner Mike, who does something obscurely medical, but he’s an early riser and sometimes beats me to the punch.

He doesn’t do our driveway, though, and stops at the alley, so I still got a brisk upper-body workout in before breakfast. And after a mug of black tea I can almost feel my fingers and toes again.

8 thoughts on “Broom waggin’”

  1. Holy Crap! It’s snowing in Houston. Like, really snowing. And it’s sticking! Now what do we do? Quick, cover up all the putting greens! Close the schools! Oh, and drive faster! To the mall! That’s it! Drive fast to the mall with your kids that you had to pick up early! Everyone–all together now–panic! Ahhhhgghh!!!!!!

  2. My family moved to Randolph AFB outside San Antone from Ottawa, Canada, and we were astounded that the two times it “snowed” in five years — about a gram’s worth each time — the schools were closed. Sheeyit, the Canucks didn’t close their schools for nothin’, which explains how I spoke French at age 8 and was able to skip a grade when we returned to the Land of the Big PX.

  3. Patrick,

    Seriously, Houston ISD and the surrounding school districts are closing. We wife’s office is closing. I suppose my office is closing, but I’ve still gotta go out there (25 miles to the west) to turn in this week’s paperwork. The TV news is scrolling every little event that’s canceled. Houston’s tree lighting ceremony for tonight has been canceled. Seriously, how awesome would it be for a big Houston Christmas tree lighting event to happen WHILE IT’S SNOWING? But no. Snow is poisonous. It can kill you.

  4. Only thing the Ottawa schools would close for would be a Stanley Cup celebration. Snow? That’s just normal stuff.

    I recall a friend and I driving up the QEW from Buffalo to Toronto for a Bob Dylan/TheBand concert waay back in January, 1974. Blinding blizzard, snow, wind, cold, jacknifed tractor-trailers everywhere, spinning half donuts in my friend’s ’69 Mustang…dang, should make a song out of this…but a full house at the concert.

    Must be something in the Molsons.

  5. Reminds me of when I worked in Charlottesville, VA after living in Northampton, MA for awhile. It started to snow in C’ville and they sent us all home – so with a free afternoon I picked up the wife and went….shopping! But the shopping center was closing too because of the snow! It was just an inch or so but the town was shut down with no plows, sanders or any type of equipment to deal with the stuff. Now we live in Sioux City, IA where they’ve salted and sanded the barely half-an-inch of the white stuff that has fallen in the last day or two like if they somehow killed it no more would fall! But we only have to “tough it out” for another week or so before we escape to sunny Santa Barbara, CA to sponge off the in-laws for the holidays.

  7. Heck, I live 30 miles from Lake Placid and it was 59 yesterday and mid 40’s today. mtb riding is good though :o)

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