Day Fifty-Nine: No More Snow

As is typical nowadays, Mother Nature is planning to dump a foot or so of snow in my area tonight through Friday (when you'll be reading this, it will have been snowing for over twelve hours, and will continue snowing for about another four or five hours). And I have gotten to the point in this long, long winter that I simply could not care any less about snow this year.

Let me preface by saying to anyone who reads this who DOESN'T live in my state (which is probably no one) that I don't live in a place where snow is expected with winter, like Utah or North Dakota. Here, we don't wear parkas in ten-below zero weather out to work everyday like it's nothing. Here, the lowest it gets in temperature during the day is somewhere in the twenties in the dead of winter, like January or parts of February. It snows a few times a year, and usually we get one or two good snows of six-inches to a foot. But not this year. This year, we've gotten two huge snowstorms, back-to-back, and another storm of about six inches, I think. And tonight, it's going to snow another foot.

I've already felt the childlike magic and the giddiness that comes with a nice snowstorm. I've had two snow days off from work (one of them was a personal day, unfortunately). I've watched my dogs play in the snow, I've shoveled out my car and other people's cars, and I've shoveled the driveway and the deck. I've made snowballs. Now, I just don't care anymore.

No, I don't care that it's going to snow. I'm not mad, because that would be completely pointless and counterproductive, given that I can do absolutely nothing about the weather. But on a very basic level, I don't care about the snow. I am not acknowledging the snow. In my mind, it isn't going to snow at all until it's actually snowing and I'm driving in it. I am refusing to let the snow win and take another personal day. And on the very slim chance that the office decides to close early tomorrow because heavy, angry, windy snow will have been accumulating for about twelve hours at that point, I won't be happy, even if I get a free half-day off.

Why, you ask? Because I will have NOTHING to do. There's nothing cozy and fun about being snowed in anymore this year. Now, it's just annoying. It's like being on house arrest, where my only options are knitting a scarf I don't need, re-reading a book I've already read, doing my laundry, watching whatever TV my dad is watching at the time, or taking a nap. But then again, I suppose I could actually do something artsy, which, in turn, might be the world's way of getting me to start being more creative.

But tomorrow, it's me versus the snow. And I'm prepared to win.

Day Forty-Six: The Best Motivation is Self-Motivation

After being snowed in for two days straight, after only a three-day reprieve from being snowed in last weekend, I lost it today. About an hour ago, I absolutely needed to burn off energy, so I went outside and shoveled the deck (a completely unnecessary, although not pointless task). For a half hour, I scraped and chopped at hardened, heavy snow, I lifted heavy loads of white crap, and threw it elsewhere. I got sweaty, I got gross, and I got cold. I also felt better than I have in a very long time.

I know I should exercise, as everybody does, really. Everybody realizes it's a good idea to get out and increase their heart rate a little bit, but nobody who makes it a priority ever wants to do it until they're actually five or ten minutes in. I am no exception to this common group of people. I don't really like the idea of getting up off the warm couch and engaging in some healthy physical activity, but once I do it (which is very rare), I feel really good. I feel better about myself and my state of health, and I feel like I'm not treating my body like garbage. It also makes me feel better about my high intake of sugar.

But although I have known that I need to join a gym ever since I stopped going after I graduated college, I have never gotten myself to do it (mostly because of the absolutely ridiculous membership fees that come along with joining). But nothing has motivated me more than feeling restless and suffocated by four walls surrounded by snow. I guess being unable to go anywhere else forced me to do the only thing I could to exert any physical energy -- exercise. Maybe being snowed-in is actually not bad for me.

Day Forty-four: This is Getting Ridiculous

It's currently Tuesday night, and the Northeastern United States is sending itself into a tizzy because -- oh, my God -- it's going to snow.

Keep in mind, if you are not from this area (which is unlikely, if you are reading this) it snowed a whole hell of a lot on Saturday. The roads, while almost completely clear, are still icy and snowy in some spots on side streets. Now, it's going to snow again. And everyone is freaking out. Personally, I don't understand why meteorologists get so worked up over a snow storm to the point where they broadcast coverage from multiple areas for hours and hours on end, tracking the amount sticking to the ground, and putting their cameras on cars stuck in snowbanks because somebody thought whatever they had to do was more important than their safety. In one story predicting tomorrow's impending storm (which will be anywhere from six to twenty inches), they actually referred to this string of constant snowstorms as the "Snowmageddon". I'm really sick of this crap. Snow, in itself, is not life-threatening. And I would be extremely surprised if two decent snowstorms within a week is enough to end the world. New England deals with it all the time.

Sure, power might go out, but we're an advanced and wealthy enough society that we can cover ourselves in several layers of clothing and blankets and either read by candlelight or play stupid drinking games for entertainment. Pipes might freeze, which would be extremely unfortunate and slightly more dangerous, but mostly it would be inconvenient. But, I don't think we'd die. So enough with the drama. It's not like it's a hurricane or an earthquake, because those are legitimate catastrophes and actually injure people and wreak havoc.

In addition to trying to frighten viewers into staying glued to their televisions, there's also this mess with constant information. Do I really need to know that PennDot is working around the clock to salt and plow roads? Do I really need to know that it has snowed half an inch in the past hour? Do I really need to know what Delaware looks like? And most of all, do I REALLY need to know that it is, in fact, STILL snowing? While it's certainly entertaining to watch blithering overpaid morons stand outside in their Totes and company-provided parka and be continuously pelted in the face with wet, cold powder, it's not doing me any good. Any of the information these dimwits are providing me I can either get by looking out my window or actually going outside. Given, in fact, that I actually care. If it's blizzarding outside, there isn't really much I can do about it, is there? Short of standing in front of the window thinking, "wow, that's going to be a real bitch to shovel," I can't do anything else. I cannot make it stop snowing, I can't clear my driveway, and I can't prevent it from getting colder. So why is it necessary that I stay alert on the current snow situation? When it stops, I'll go outside and deal with it. And by then, the news crews won't find the storm nearly as interesting and will move on to sticking cameras in the faces of people trying to clear their sidewalks.

So really, it's getting ridiculous. Enough with the storm coverage. Maybe, just maybe, because we've had one really good snow storm already, the news crews will not care quite as much about this bout of snow. And I'll sit inside and watch it snow and go stir-crazy, again.

Day Forty: Snowed In

It's amazing what we turn to for entertainment when we become snowed in and our options for entertainment become dangerously limited to a stir-crazy proportion. Given that I was snowed in most of last weekend, I don't know how much more of staying barricaded inside a cozy dwelling away from the elements I can take. It's much better than the alternative, but myself and many other people (most of whom in South Jersey, undoubtedly), are getting really sick of snow. And it certainly doesn't help that our little winter snowfall is being dubbed "the storm of the season" with states and counties declaring states of emergency and actually fining people for leaving their houses. God help us all.

Therefore, even before the first flurries fell, any possibility of plans I may have had for the weekend were quickly dashed. Knowing I would be confined to my house for the evening, I began to undertake the task of making a neat little list of all the furniture and furnishing items I would need to purchase when I eventually move, which will hopefully be soonish. I began thinking this could be a fun little project that would be both productive, and take a considerable amount of my evening. I would get a nice sense of accomplishment and entertain myself in the process, fending off cabin fever for at least the first day of this winter storm.

But what it turned into was a three-hour online search for a comforter. My mother got frustrated, I hated everything, and we both ended up exhausted and laughing at horribly ugly carribbean themed bedding with flamingos and sunsets. Needless to say, it got a little out of hand. While we were pretty entertained, what started as a nice little task ended as a debacle immensely picky proportions. I'm already feeling a little stir-crazy after staring at a screen for the better part of my day today. So tomorrow, it will be cake baking and decorating, and hopefully that will ward off the fear of being locked inside for yet another weekend.

So as I'm sitting here, watching feet of snow build up around me, I'm wondering what other people are doing to keep themselves occupied over the snowy weekend. A lot of people (myself not included) have the social and economic embarassment that is the Super Bowl on Sunday to occupy themselves, so I'm sure that helps. If you're in the Northwestern U.S., what are you doing to keep yourself occupied? Hopefully, you have a bottle of something strong and a friend with you to help the process.