Finally!

Finally! It stopped snowing some time last night. I don't know the finally tally, but it's closer to 2 ft than I'd like. The good news is that even though the drivers aren't really prepared for this type of snow, the street and road workers are. It gets cleared faster and better than it ever did back home. There seems to be a greater concentration of plows and trucks, which is very nice. The only problem is whether or not you can get out of your driveway. Back home in Illinois we had about 400 feet of it, here about 20 ft. It was a welcome change the past few days.

Our British friends however, have a driveway similar to our old one. They didn't leave the house for two days and when I talked to him this morning, he claimed to still have 75 yards of driveway left to clear. So after dropping off the kids at school I headed over with my run-of-the mill snow shovel. After about 5 or 6 shovel fulls I noticed my English friend was staring at me in disbelief. "Bloody hell" he muttered. For a second or two I was feeling cocky. I thought he was impressed with the speed at which I could relocate some snow. Then he followed it with this, "That's an amazing shovel". It was then I noticed that he was holding a glorified garden spade. It would never have occurred to me that someone had never seen a snow shovel in action.

He's lived in the UK, Australia, and California and in none of these locations had he ever had to deal with more than the random inch or two of snow. Thus, he had never had use for or even seen a snow shovel. I couldn't help feeling a little like Tom Sawyer when I said, "Oh, it's great. Give it a try". He handed it back 5 minutes later, I think the novelty wore off quickly.

An hour later we were having a coffee at his kitchen table when he remarked that he now had a free day to do whatever he liked. Seems he had taken the day off to get his driveway cleared.

I couldn't make this stuff up.