Saturday, February 27, 2010

Walking in a Winter Record-Breaking Wonderland

Well, it's been a long time since I've posted on this blog. So I thought I'd talk about one of the things I really missed while I was in NZ that wasn't a person: SNOW! As I may have stated in a previous post, Hamilton had absolutely no snow, ever. So why am I posting about it now? Mainly something that has caught my interest completely, because we have had so much snow this Februrary! Actually, we've had so much snow this month, that it has become the most snow ever to have fallen in Pittsburgh in any month in recorded history! We've had over 41 inches (104 cm) of snow here, and there is still snow falling as I write this post. This is most definitely one of the kinds of snowfall that I've dreamed about, but never expected to get in this city in my lifetime. Well, this definitely chalks up my first "When I was your age" story to tell to my grandkids... Coming along with this extreme snow came 6 snow days at school, and 3 or 4 2-hour delays! During one of these weeks, I had essentially a 9-day weekend in the middle of February because we had an entire SNOW WEEK. It was quite the unexpected occurrence. There was a foot (something like 30 cm) of snow after two nights when the entire fiasco started.

I know it was horrible for many people, as they couldn't get to work, had cars stuck, etc. Personally, however, I liked nearly all of this. I got to shovel over 5 tons of water in the form of snow, but I probably could have shoveled a lot more. Hearing stories about people who really needed help with the shoveling kinda makes me feel bad, because I probably could have helped out a whole lot of people. If I had asked people to pay me at all, I probably could have made more than 100, even 200 dollars if I went around enough. Something to keep in mind for the future, I am reminded by my parents. Well, still, this has been a great winter for me, or at least, the greatest February. We've had many postponed ski trips at school, but they all have been rescheduled, and they were great as well. I think my friends and family took some pictures of the snow, and I might want to end up posting them, but I'm not sure. Anyway, just a little update of mine. Hope everyone's doing well in the first quarter of 2010!