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I’ll take the
snow
By Susan Olling
It’s been a week since the Blizzard of 2016, or Snowstorm Jonas as some
are christening it. Why someone started naming winter storms is
mystifying. Perhaps too much time on his/her hands?
Anyway, there’s been much here in the greater D.C. environs to observe
in the past week. Some good, some bad, and some funny.
Kudos are in order for the following.
Pepco. As recently as 2010, storms caused widespread, lengthy
power outages in their service area, which includes our part of
MoCo. Our local electric utility has been trimming trees,
replacing poles, and reinforcing power lines since then. We were
ready for a power outage in our house. Not even a flicker.
Some of the local news talking heads seemed a bit disappointed that
they couldn’t report thousands of power outages.
Road crews. These folks are still working long hours to get the
snow off the roads. Residential neighborhoods weren’t the first
priority. When and whether the road crews were able to plow
curb-to-curb or one lane in the middle of our street would happen when
it happened. We had no problem staying off the roads.
Metro. Our little subway system was closed for the weekend.
Made perfect sense. People were strongly encouraged to stay off
the roads. Not much, if anything, was open. Certainly
nothing touristy. The safety of Metro employees was as important
as the safety of the rest of us.
Office of Personnel Management (OPM). This time, OPM got it
right. And before anybody squawks, there was no public
transportation to speak of on Monday and Tuesday. Many
neighborhood streets were unplowed, particularly in Northern
Virginia. The main roads still needed work. Interstate 270,
for example, went from six lanes to three at the Spur (where I-270
meets the Capital Beltway). Closing the federal government on
Monday and Tuesday and three-hour delays on Wednesday and Thursday with
the option of liberal leave or telework was spot on.
Then there are those for whom a “thumbs down” is in order.
Local NHL team. This bunch had a game scheduled for 22 Jan and
decided to move the start time from 7:00 p.m. to 5:00 p.m. There
were questions as to whether team officials were considering the safety
of their fans and the team. Finally, the game was
postponed. Team officials were evidently reluctant to postpone
the game because the opposing team was from the West Coast, and
rescheduling would be difficult. It’s just a game.
Drivers who cleared very little snow off their vehicles. A
chronic problem here when it snows. It’s hard to tell whether
it’s laziness or a disregard for other drivers. In any
case, give ‘em lots of room when you see them on the roads.
Metro. Service on our little subway system was reasonably back to
normal by Friday. That’s a charitable description. Shorter
trains were running because cars were still being dug out of the snow,
inspected, or repaired. No surprise, there were lots of unhappy
passengers trying to get to work. Station platforms were crowded,
and trains were filled with people. The criminal element, in the
form of teenagers, was having a field day. One poor man was
mugged by one of these groups as he was trying to exit a train one
morning. Fortunately, six fine examples of the teenaged
population here were arrested. That same afternoon, a group of
about twenty of the little dears were reportedly yelling and harassing
passengers on a train. They reportedly hit a man in the face with
a snowball and began beating him.
People who thought parking spaces on D.C. streets were their personal
spaces. They spent quite a bit of time cleaning their vehicles
and clearing space to get them out. For some reason, there were
errands to be run. When these drivers returned, they found that
others had taken “their” cleared parking spaces.
As I noted earlier, there was some good, some bad, and some funny that
came out of all this frozen precipitation. The something funny
occurred on Tuesday, 26 Jan. No XY-chromosome carriers could be
found in the U.S. Senate chamber. No male pages, no male
parliamentarians, no male senators. But the female pages, female
parliamentarians, and female senators were able to get to the Capitol.
We’re not done with snow yet, if past winters are any
indication. Unfortunately, after winter comes the weed
festival and all those tourists. I think I’ll take the snow.
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