When it Snows
Last week it snowed, and it was magnificent!
Being a Florida girl, and for the last six years a South Florida girl, snow has never been something that I have spent a lot of time around or in. Therefore, I found the two days of snow last week quite thrilling.
Now I've been to cold places before, the place I grew up in Florida has colder winters than I've generally experienced here in England, and I've been around snow when I have traveled to the Carolina's, Tennessee and California, but most of my snow experiences were a long time ago when I was a child, and while the snow was quite deep in California, it had already fallen.
On Thursday it snowed where I'm staying. Ben and I were supposed to go to Birmingham that day, but it was decided that we'd go the next day because we wouldn't have to worry about frozen roads. It wasn't a lot of snow, but it was beautiful and Ben and I built a snowman. I wore black gloves and held my hands out to catch the snow. Upon inspection I discovered that snowflakes actually look like the paper snowflakes children make!
On Friday we drove to Birmingham. It was supposed to rain all day, therefore cancellilng the chances of any snow... that's what the weathermen said... but when we were most of the way there, it started snowing. This made me very happy, but Ben sensed the impending danger and was less pleased about the weather conditions. By the time we reached the second or third stop we had to make, it was snowing at a decent rate, and while waiting in the car, I decided it would be best if I got out of the car and stood in the snow. I got a few strange looks from people hurrying from their cars to the nearby building, probably because I was just standing there getting snowed on and they all knew that as soon as I got in the car the snow would turn into extremely cold water and run from my head down my neck, back and shoulders, and Ben found it absolutely hilarious that I was just standing next to the car in the snow when he came out, but I had never been snowed on quite like that, and I found it rather amusing.
The snow that was falling in Birmingham that day was not like the delicate snowflakes that I had seen the day before; this snow was falling more in the form of large, clumsy flakes that made noise when they hit solid objects, the ground, and myself, and as the day progressed, they fell harder and harder and started causing a few problems.
Now you must understand that the following is not a personal opinion, that the pictures I am about to paint are not exaggerated and what they imply is a widely accepted fact among the English. I honestly had no idea exactly what I was in for and exactly how serious the radio DJ's were when they said something to the effect of, "America gets seven feet of snow every year, and they just clear the roads and get on with it, but we get seven inches of snow and everything just grinds to a halt. I mean, quite honestly, it's ridiculous." And he was absolutely right...
At first things didn't seem so bad; sure, traffic was going pretty slow, but certainly the roads would have been treated for the conditions, and people don't simply forget how to drive when it snows, right? Wrong. The roads were very slippery -- the few who didn't forget how to drive still had difficulties getting around and those who couldn't remember for the life of them what driving was in the first place caused all kinds of chaos... it was like they just didn't understand the conditions and the fact that they had to remain patient and take into consideration that everyone around them was going through the same thing. Those people were jerks and caused extra and unnecessary delay which had a domino effect, possibly doubling the hours of gridlocked traffic.
From what I gather, however, England simply doesn't cope well with snow and frozen conditions; it is not properly prepared for, people panic, schools close, offices close, people don't go to work, deliveries are not made, shops run out of food, traffic comes to a halt and then the people who grit the road so that it can be used safely get stuck in the traffic caused by the slippery conditions. Everything literally comes to a screeching halt and falls to pieces.
There were some interesting things to see, though... the bus slipping down the road, the Roving Bands of Able Young Men, and some other pretty sights in this winter wonderland.
I greatly enjoyed my day and evening in snowy, gridlocked Birmingham, although I don't think I'd love it so much if I were accustomed to it and got stuck in the traffic getting out of work, having my 15 minute trip home turn into a two hour crawl as many people broadcasted on the radio spoke about.
In any case, there was no denying that it was a winter wonderland, and that it was gorgeous.
Oh, and also...
Being a Florida girl, and for the last six years a South Florida girl, snow has never been something that I have spent a lot of time around or in. Therefore, I found the two days of snow last week quite thrilling.
Now I've been to cold places before, the place I grew up in Florida has colder winters than I've generally experienced here in England, and I've been around snow when I have traveled to the Carolina's, Tennessee and California, but most of my snow experiences were a long time ago when I was a child, and while the snow was quite deep in California, it had already fallen.
On Thursday it snowed where I'm staying. Ben and I were supposed to go to Birmingham that day, but it was decided that we'd go the next day because we wouldn't have to worry about frozen roads. It wasn't a lot of snow, but it was beautiful and Ben and I built a snowman. I wore black gloves and held my hands out to catch the snow. Upon inspection I discovered that snowflakes actually look like the paper snowflakes children make!
On Friday we drove to Birmingham. It was supposed to rain all day, therefore cancellilng the chances of any snow... that's what the weathermen said... but when we were most of the way there, it started snowing. This made me very happy, but Ben sensed the impending danger and was less pleased about the weather conditions. By the time we reached the second or third stop we had to make, it was snowing at a decent rate, and while waiting in the car, I decided it would be best if I got out of the car and stood in the snow. I got a few strange looks from people hurrying from their cars to the nearby building, probably because I was just standing there getting snowed on and they all knew that as soon as I got in the car the snow would turn into extremely cold water and run from my head down my neck, back and shoulders, and Ben found it absolutely hilarious that I was just standing next to the car in the snow when he came out, but I had never been snowed on quite like that, and I found it rather amusing.
The snow that was falling in Birmingham that day was not like the delicate snowflakes that I had seen the day before; this snow was falling more in the form of large, clumsy flakes that made noise when they hit solid objects, the ground, and myself, and as the day progressed, they fell harder and harder and started causing a few problems.
Now you must understand that the following is not a personal opinion, that the pictures I am about to paint are not exaggerated and what they imply is a widely accepted fact among the English. I honestly had no idea exactly what I was in for and exactly how serious the radio DJ's were when they said something to the effect of, "America gets seven feet of snow every year, and they just clear the roads and get on with it, but we get seven inches of snow and everything just grinds to a halt. I mean, quite honestly, it's ridiculous." And he was absolutely right...
At first things didn't seem so bad; sure, traffic was going pretty slow, but certainly the roads would have been treated for the conditions, and people don't simply forget how to drive when it snows, right? Wrong. The roads were very slippery -- the few who didn't forget how to drive still had difficulties getting around and those who couldn't remember for the life of them what driving was in the first place caused all kinds of chaos... it was like they just didn't understand the conditions and the fact that they had to remain patient and take into consideration that everyone around them was going through the same thing. Those people were jerks and caused extra and unnecessary delay which had a domino effect, possibly doubling the hours of gridlocked traffic.
From what I gather, however, England simply doesn't cope well with snow and frozen conditions; it is not properly prepared for, people panic, schools close, offices close, people don't go to work, deliveries are not made, shops run out of food, traffic comes to a halt and then the people who grit the road so that it can be used safely get stuck in the traffic caused by the slippery conditions. Everything literally comes to a screeching halt and falls to pieces.
There were some interesting things to see, though... the bus slipping down the road, the Roving Bands of Able Young Men, and some other pretty sights in this winter wonderland.
I greatly enjoyed my day and evening in snowy, gridlocked Birmingham, although I don't think I'd love it so much if I were accustomed to it and got stuck in the traffic getting out of work, having my 15 minute trip home turn into a two hour crawl as many people broadcasted on the radio spoke about.
In any case, there was no denying that it was a winter wonderland, and that it was gorgeous.
Oh, and also...
posted by joey at 2:38 PM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home