Life in a Time of Snow
Jan. 11th, 2007 09:28 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
akirluThe ankle is a fair bit better today, and Seattle main campus is of course open, though Tacoma and Bothell are not, and so I hied myself to work.
Overnight the snow turned crisp and hard, like thick icing sugar. It snaps and crunches when you walk on it.
The first challenge turned out to be getting into the car. Neither the driver nor the passenger door lock would turn with the key, and while it was possible to unlock the back hatch, the hatch itself was frozen to the car. Hal finally managed to heave up hard enough to open the hatch, and I crawled into the cargo area to reach in and unlock one of the back doors manually. De-icing the windows wasn't too bad, just because Hal had been down to the grocery store last night and not much had accumulated since then.
Down at Bear Creek, my dark suspicion was confirmed. Snow Route day meant that the 268 was originating from Bear Creek rather than Fall City Road, and it would have been futile to stand waiting for the bus at the usual stop by our place. Hills are scary in the snow. Luckily I already know that Metro is very much a fair weather friend, I so was in the right place instead of waiting at an abandoned stop for a bus that would never come. Hal dropped me off and I spent a little time contemplating making snowballs out of the snow accumulated on the hoods of the cars that had been left overnight. Tempting, but I didn't do it, though by the marks I wouldn't have been the first to try.
Snow falls on the just and the unjust alike, it seems. It had been a while since I really had a chance to see how thoroughly a heavy snowfall winds up on *everything*, though. It's kind of amazing. I expected the conifers to get that nice, decorative picture-postcard dusting of white. I didn't expect the bare hardwoods to get such an accumulation. Marymoor Park looked like some eerie phantom spring-time; the deciduous trees were so heavily loaded with hoar frost and snow that their canopies filled in, as if they were blooming. And the cyclone fencing around the athletic fields was full of snow, too, lacy white so it looked like bridal veil netting. Even the backs of the street signs had granules of snow clinging to them, and little piles of it on top of the sign posts.
Which is how I know Microsoft must be paying one hell of a heating bill, because unlike all the other buildings in the area, there was not a speck of accumulated snow on the rooftops of main campus.
The freeways were largely empty -- all the people who were traumatized by three and four hour commutes last night seem to have decided to stay home today. Ironically, the roads were gorgeous. The WSDOT trucks had done their job and all the freeways were clear and sanded and ice-free. But there were still signs of last night's commute littering the roadside. I lost count of the number of snowed-over abandoned vehicles. The surprising one was the snowed over motorcycle, looking sadly buried as it stood facing the wrong way on the verge between Yarrow Point and Evergreen Point.
And now it's a gloriously sunny snow day. The squirrels are totally undeterred, setting off little avalanches as they raid campus trash cans. When the wind blows it seems like it's snowing from clear skies as the fallen stuff gets blown about. I particularly like the way the spindrift ghosts of it go skirrling along the swept paths whenever a gust blows by.
One of the faculty has borrowed the department camera, or I would go out and take some snow pictures. Y'all will have to settle for word pictures instead.
Overnight the snow turned crisp and hard, like thick icing sugar. It snaps and crunches when you walk on it.
The first challenge turned out to be getting into the car. Neither the driver nor the passenger door lock would turn with the key, and while it was possible to unlock the back hatch, the hatch itself was frozen to the car. Hal finally managed to heave up hard enough to open the hatch, and I crawled into the cargo area to reach in and unlock one of the back doors manually. De-icing the windows wasn't too bad, just because Hal had been down to the grocery store last night and not much had accumulated since then.
Down at Bear Creek, my dark suspicion was confirmed. Snow Route day meant that the 268 was originating from Bear Creek rather than Fall City Road, and it would have been futile to stand waiting for the bus at the usual stop by our place. Hills are scary in the snow. Luckily I already know that Metro is very much a fair weather friend, I so was in the right place instead of waiting at an abandoned stop for a bus that would never come. Hal dropped me off and I spent a little time contemplating making snowballs out of the snow accumulated on the hoods of the cars that had been left overnight. Tempting, but I didn't do it, though by the marks I wouldn't have been the first to try.
Snow falls on the just and the unjust alike, it seems. It had been a while since I really had a chance to see how thoroughly a heavy snowfall winds up on *everything*, though. It's kind of amazing. I expected the conifers to get that nice, decorative picture-postcard dusting of white. I didn't expect the bare hardwoods to get such an accumulation. Marymoor Park looked like some eerie phantom spring-time; the deciduous trees were so heavily loaded with hoar frost and snow that their canopies filled in, as if they were blooming. And the cyclone fencing around the athletic fields was full of snow, too, lacy white so it looked like bridal veil netting. Even the backs of the street signs had granules of snow clinging to them, and little piles of it on top of the sign posts.
Which is how I know Microsoft must be paying one hell of a heating bill, because unlike all the other buildings in the area, there was not a speck of accumulated snow on the rooftops of main campus.
The freeways were largely empty -- all the people who were traumatized by three and four hour commutes last night seem to have decided to stay home today. Ironically, the roads were gorgeous. The WSDOT trucks had done their job and all the freeways were clear and sanded and ice-free. But there were still signs of last night's commute littering the roadside. I lost count of the number of snowed-over abandoned vehicles. The surprising one was the snowed over motorcycle, looking sadly buried as it stood facing the wrong way on the verge between Yarrow Point and Evergreen Point.
And now it's a gloriously sunny snow day. The squirrels are totally undeterred, setting off little avalanches as they raid campus trash cans. When the wind blows it seems like it's snowing from clear skies as the fallen stuff gets blown about. I particularly like the way the spindrift ghosts of it go skirrling along the swept paths whenever a gust blows by.
One of the faculty has borrowed the department camera, or I would go out and take some snow pictures. Y'all will have to settle for word pictures instead.
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