Monday, January 31, 2005
Yesterday was the absolute worst weather I have ever been in, hands down. (Hands Down is a phrase that needs some explaining here in Finland. I have had to go into detailed explanation of that phrase more than once, and I don't really know what the hell it means.) Back to the weather, we had our Sunday basketball game, which takes place at a school across the river, which means I have to cross the bridge - normally a non-event. Of course it was snowing, but it was snowing like that montage in Forest Gump when he is explaining all the different ways it would rain in Vietnam. This had all those ways and then some and this was no montage, it was all happening in the same moment.
Snow was falling from the sky, being whipped by winds that must have been at least 25 m.p.h. These winds were also whipping any and all snow off of trees, buildings, the piles of snow that the plows shovel into various corners of the paths, the powder snow resting on top of the icey river, and the snow on the street. In other words, snow was hitting me from above, below and from the sides. All this was ok, while I was in the forest, but in order to get to this damned basketball court I needed to cross the bridge and this is where things got a little nasty, well a lot nasty. The snow was thick on the ground, making it harder to bike. The wind coming off of the river was blowing me around like a feather and that wind was also 10 degrees, which, in the span of 30 seconds began to freeze the right side of my face, literally. I've written about ice in the nose, but this was a nose of ice. My right nostril froze completely, while the left nostril was just fine and still I was not but halfway across that bridge. By the time I actually got the the basketball game, I was wiped out and covered in sweat, and melted ice. And the whole time I was playing I kept thinking about the fact that I would have to do that f--king trip again. Well, for balance sake I guess it was the right thing to do. No sense in temporarily freezing the right side of my face, without letting the left side have some fun too.
Today saw a continuation of the blizzard and I mean blizzard. This is so much worse than the blizzard we had when we were living in Brooklyn. That one was a delight. Everything shut down, but the mood was jovial. The mood here was violent and accursed, other planetary and to make matters worse, nothing is closed, these idiots clear the snow every 20 minutes. Almost every 5th car on the road is shoveling snow. My bus stop was completely filled with snow, so we all had to wait outside while the snow fell furiously. The only good thing was that it wasn't too cold on top of it all. There was no way I was taking my bike to work today. No freaking way.
Snow was falling from the sky, being whipped by winds that must have been at least 25 m.p.h. These winds were also whipping any and all snow off of trees, buildings, the piles of snow that the plows shovel into various corners of the paths, the powder snow resting on top of the icey river, and the snow on the street. In other words, snow was hitting me from above, below and from the sides. All this was ok, while I was in the forest, but in order to get to this damned basketball court I needed to cross the bridge and this is where things got a little nasty, well a lot nasty. The snow was thick on the ground, making it harder to bike. The wind coming off of the river was blowing me around like a feather and that wind was also 10 degrees, which, in the span of 30 seconds began to freeze the right side of my face, literally. I've written about ice in the nose, but this was a nose of ice. My right nostril froze completely, while the left nostril was just fine and still I was not but halfway across that bridge. By the time I actually got the the basketball game, I was wiped out and covered in sweat, and melted ice. And the whole time I was playing I kept thinking about the fact that I would have to do that f--king trip again. Well, for balance sake I guess it was the right thing to do. No sense in temporarily freezing the right side of my face, without letting the left side have some fun too.
Today saw a continuation of the blizzard and I mean blizzard. This is so much worse than the blizzard we had when we were living in Brooklyn. That one was a delight. Everything shut down, but the mood was jovial. The mood here was violent and accursed, other planetary and to make matters worse, nothing is closed, these idiots clear the snow every 20 minutes. Almost every 5th car on the road is shoveling snow. My bus stop was completely filled with snow, so we all had to wait outside while the snow fell furiously. The only good thing was that it wasn't too cold on top of it all. There was no way I was taking my bike to work today. No freaking way.
// posted by Howard @ 2:51 PM 
