It's Still Coming Down

It's nearly 10:00 PM, and the snow is still coming down rather heavily.

The power company truck has been working at the telephone pole by our driveway for quite a while, occasionally causing our lights to flicker on and off.

(The pole by our driveway has both a transformer and a junction box. The utility workers have been working on the junction box, which they had wide open to the elements.)

As expected, I had to go and pick up Ariana and 'Miah at Amanda's 2 miles down the road.

But first I had to dig my way out of the driveway in a marathon digging session, and then slowly proceed down the road in 2nd gear.

I didn't get too far because fighter fighters were standing in the middle of the road where a tree branch had fallen down. So I had to wait for several minutes with the other cars that were also stuck waiting.

When I finally got through, it was tough finding Amanda's house because the entire Crescent Beach and Point Connett area was without power. It was pitch black.

I pulled over to where I thought Amanda's house was. And before I could call Ariana on her cell phone, there she was with 'Miah, who was holding a huge plastic garbage bag filled with soaking wet clothes.

The kids wanted to have a winter adventure. And that they did.

Coming back, we encountered large, impassable piles of snow in the middle of the road that were left by some inconsiderate snow plow driver.

Both Ariana and 'Miah got out of the car to kick some of the piles down to create a small opening through which I could pass.

But before I could proceed through the Scylla and Charybdis of snow piles, a big truck came up from behind us and mowed those piles down to size.

Isn't it nice how people help each other out in weather such as this?

While driving back, Ariana and 'Miah claimed to have seen lightning. They were freaked out by it. I told them, that while rare, it is not unheard of to have lightning ~ and thunder ~ during a snow storm.

I remember one winter, before Ariana was even a thought in Neil's and my mind, let alone a wee stirring in my womb, I was travelling home from work in the middle of a fierce blizzard with white-out conditions.

As traffic was inching at an agonizingly slow pace to get onto the highway, I looked up at the sky and saw definite flashes of lightning behind the heavy snow clouds. It was one of the coolest sights I've ever seen.

Well, we finally made it home.

The kids' clothes are still drying in the dryer.

The utility truck has moved on for now.

And the lights are still occasionally flickering.

For 2 years in a row, we had extremely mild winters with hardly any snow. And now Mother Nature is making up for her 2 years of slacking.

We are getting walloped.

The bushes in the dog yard are so laden with heavy snow that access to the dog igloos is blocked.

It seems as though we will be snowed in for this weekend.

It'll be just the 3 of us here ~ Ariana, 'Miah, and me.