It’s snowing here in the Washington, DC area today. Already they’re calling it the snowpocalypse, the snownami, and of course “The Blizzard of 2009”. People around here tend to overreact when it snows because we don’t generally get large accumulations. Naturally everyone stripped the grocery stores bare of milk, bread, and toilet paper as it approached. So predictable.
It’s an odd manifestation of a herd instinct. The cities and counties don’t have equipment to deal with anything more than a couple of inches. Of course they can’t prepare for something of an even larger scale that happens maybe once every five or ten years. Thus, the populace fell into in full panic buying mode yesterday evening.
Staring Outside
This is how it appeared around 9:30 this morning from the safety and warmth of our enclosed porch.
I measured eight inches of snow on the ground a few moments ago. Meanwhile, we’re still waiting for the heaviest part of the storm to arrive. Weather officials expanded a blizzard warning over our specific location a little while ago. The meteorologist on the local television station just said he can’t recall ever seeing a blizzard warning issued for the District of Columbia. We, of course, live just across the border in the Commonwealth. So apparently we’re right in the thick of it too.
Ironically, we decided to remain in Virginia over the holidays because of the awful weather we experienced when we visited the in-laws in Wisconsin last winter. Now they’re calling for 15-24 inches here by the time the storm passes this evening.
Nothing Better to Do
This is one of those days where we’ll remain indoors as the snow falls and the winds howl. I don’t have anywhere I need to go. We finished the Christmas shopping. Everyone is warm and happy. I have a big mug of coffee and a pile of unread magazines. Also, the plows took three days to get to our street the last time it snowed this much. I guess it looks looks like we’re here for the duration.
Tomorrow we’ll venture out into the neighborhood and explore the drifted terrain on foot. Stay tuned for what is likely to be an impressive set of photos.
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