Sun, 07 Feb 2010
Snowpocalypse
This was the weekend of the big snowstorm of 2010. I've survived the experience and here's the story. I took off from work Friday so that I could get my usual weekend shopping done before the storm hit. This is Baltimore, so of course the grocery store was mobbed. (Does this happen in other cities?) It must have been mobbed the night before, because many things were sold out. Some I understand, such as chips. (Seems to be the snack food of choice in snow storms. That, and beer, but grocery stores aren't allowed to sell beer in Baltimore. Plus, it is Superbowl weekend.) Other foods, maybe I understand, like margarine. (Maybe everyone is making Chex party mix.) Other shortages had me scratching my head, like lentils. I was able to get most of what was on my list. (No lentils or frozen vegetables.) I had to wait in the checkout line for half an hour, though.
When I find myself waiting like this, I pull out my cellphone and start the ereader program. Right now I am reading Flaubert's book, "The Temptation of Saint Anthony." I've wanted to read this book ever since it was mentioned in an episode of Dragnet, In the episode a mopey high school kid engages in a thrill kill after reading the book. In the episode a librarian reads the page in the book that inspired him. But it's not an easy book to get, and so I haven't read it until now. The book is strange, written in a very flowery style with a heightened sense of what was grotesque and bizarre in the late Classical world Anthony lived in. One phrase the sticks in my mind is a shield Anthony is offered, whose dragon skins were "tanned in the bile of a parricide." I'm sure Flaubert had a lot of fun writing this book and I'm having fun reading it.
The snowstorm started Friday night, but really didn't get serious until after I went to bed. I woke up to a full blizzard, with thunder and lightning. The snow lasted until mid-afternoon. Then it stopped quite suddenly, the sky cleared and the late afternoon sun shone on two feet of new snow. My car was buries under it, plus had additional snow that had been blown against it or had been plowed against it. I spent five hours or more Saturday and Sunday clearing out my car. It was really hard work and left me aching. So I took a homeopathic remedy (arnica), which helped a lot. All you skeptics out there who believe homeopathy is just a placebo effect, please note. Before I took the arnica, I had bruises on the palm of my hands from shoveling. Two hours after taking the arnica the bruises were no longer there. So say what you will about homeopathy. I am still a believer, because experience has made me so.
