the big BLIZZARD !

There was a huge snow storm in the Chicago area.  It was much anticipated and reported.  There was so much talk about it before it happened (it began Tuesday afternoon and snowed until late Wednesday morning), that I figured it would be one of those instances (like Y2K) that was so built up and worried about that not much would happen to justify all the worry.

But it was a big storm.  I was still working at the law firm when the blizzard began, and the snow seemed to be pouring from the sky.  It was blowing furiously.  We were told that we were going to be sent home early, at 3 pm and that we would not be working on Wednesday. 

We were let out at 3:00, but my train would not leave for home until 3:45 (it's only a 10-minute walk to the train station).  So, I strolled leisurely to the train station, but I was in for a surprise when I was at the train station.  Almost a 1/2 hour before the train was supposed to leave the train was nearly filled already !  It was going to leave as soon as it filled and if it filled  at 3:35 it would leave then rather than 3:45.  & that's exactly what happened.   We left early, and I felt really lucky to get a seat on the train.  Many people were standing in the aisle. 

After getting off the train, and driving the mile home, it was very apparent that driving would be tricky with such slick roads.  I bought some groceries that I figured we would need.  The snow continued to fall and pour from the sky.  Then we had a very unique weather event occur.  We had thunder snow, during the night, we were not only getting the snow but thunder and lightning also.  The meteorologists noted that was very rare.   Brianna gets worried about bad weather, so she was asking, "Will our condo blow down?  Could we get a tornado".  No, we reassured her.   However, there have been times in the past, I would "josh" her and say well maybe something terrible would happen and that indeed would get her scared.  We would then quickly calm her down and say we were just kidding.  But I wasn't really in the mood to do that this time.  Also there were a number of things to really worry about:

1. If the electricity somehow got cut off by a downed power line (from ice or all the snow) we would not only have no lights but no heat, b/c we have electric heat. The only thing we would be able to do is huddle up under a blanket or go to Maribeth's dad's place in the hopes that he had electricity.  But thankfully, our electricity was fine.  However, for about 60,000 people in Chicago there was no electricity, and it must have been very difficult.

2. The snow the next morning was so high that it almost covered the hood of my car. So the concern was with all that snow, would my car start?

3. If the roads were bad (and many roads were filled w/ snow and not plowed) would Maribeth be able to go to work in the morning? 

4.  We still needed some groceries, were the stores open?   Most of the stores were closed.  But our Jewel was open.  There were some aisles in the store that were completely bare, and it was an amazing site.  Most of the time you are used to the aisles being covered with food begging to be sold.  Yet here, for one of the very few times, there was scarcity.  I grabbed one of the last bag of buns so that we could have sloppy joes for lunch. 

I was proud of our little community at the condo.  People worked together and got each other's car uncovered from all the snow.  We directed people to go where the parking lots for the condo had already been plowed and opened up.  It's amazing how much can be done when people work together. 

Here are some pictures of the condo and piles of snow that dwarfed us:

In the last picture, the snow nearly covered up the bush and was 1/4 of the way up the tree. 

I was surprised to find out that the law firm was going to be closed tomorrow too.  It has completely stopped snowing, much of the snow has been removed, so what was the problem?  I'm sure it's something obvious that I haven't considered, like many streets still remain unplowed. There is also going to be very bitterly cold weather which will make going to work much more difficult.  However, below zero weather has not stopped the community before.  So, I would imagine it must be a combination of things that is keeping our law firm closed.

Maribeth will be working, so I will be watching the kids tomorrow. She was pretty happy that I was getting it off b/c the kids would be taken care of.  There was a story that 1,500 cars were trapped on Lake Shore Drive and many people were stuck in their cold car and had no place to go because this major thoroughfare was completely jammed.    I do remember going home on the train and seeing I-90/94 (The Dan Ryan) completely filled with cars going nowhere.  They ended up making it home but those on Lakeshore Drive didn't until much later.