Snow

All day and all night Fri, the only thing you heard on the news and weather forecasts was snow, snow, SNOW!

Typically in the metro DC area we get several predictions of snow in the winter. Most of the time the hype is worse than the storm. The news channels start reporting about "Blizzard '06" and "Storm Watch 9" before the first flakes have fallen. This was no exception.

Originally they said the snow would start in the early morning on Sat, then by Fri evening it was revised to starting around noon. I believe I started seeing flurries around noon, but it was still 37 degrees outside so it wasn't sticking. We went out and ran some errands.

Finally around 4:30 the snow changed from flurries to real snow, just as the temperature went down enough that the snow started to stick. Within a few hours it was gorgeous outside. But when I went to bed Sat night it appeared to be only 2-3 inches on the ground.

Sun morning it was a different story. It must have continued snowing all night long, and with the temperature being near or below freezing, it really began to pile up. I estimate we got about a foot of snow by 10:30 Sun morning when I went outside to join my neighbors who were already shoveling their sidewalks.

It was a dry, light snow that hung in the trees. It was just beautiful outside. I spent about an hour and a half shoveling the sidewalk that leads from our front porch to the main sidewalk, the main sidewalk in front of our house and our next door neighbor with the bad hip's house, and our driveway. It was great to hear the distant laughs and screams of kids sledding and sliding down the hill in the street on the next block up.

But today my back muscles were contesting! They weren't used to that kind of workout. But I'm not sorry. It is the kind of soreness that reminds you its good to be alive and well enough to be able to shovel... and enjoy that blanket of white.