Wednesday, March 09, 2005

a winter accessory (who are we kidding? Necessity) gone MIA

I bundled up this morning – two pairs of socks (one wool), boots, turtleneck and thick wool sweater, my jacket, scarf, mittens and and hat. Feeling a bit like the preverbal child who gets all set to go and then needs to go the to bathroom, I headed out into the crazy excuse for a plowed street.

The snow packed in around my car was almost three feet wide from the side of my car to the street, and the pile hit about midway up the side of my door. It was a disaster. I fetched the shovel from my backseat and started the car from the passengers side (no use trying to open the driver’s side door) and proceeded to start digging out. Half and hour went by and I hadn’t really made a dent in all the snow, partially because I couldn’t just push it away from the car and had to cart it around to the other side of the car to dump it. At the start of my shoveling I found myself thinking about how much I want a garage. A covered structure so I don’t have to scrape my windows, or get all of the snow off of Kennedy before I go somewhere. This thought progressed to how nice it’d be to have a garage AND a boyfriend/husband who liked to use our snowblower. Then I got to thinking about how great a garage, boyfriend/husband, snowblower AND plow truck would be. I decided that it’d be decadent.

(truth be told I’ve always wanted to drive a plow; not one of those “do it yourself” plows, but a real “city-issued” flashing lights and sand things attached plow truck. I can only imagine what it’s like to drive around knowing that you won’t slip off the road in even the worst of storms!)

I continued to dig, push and rearrange the snow around my car, becoming more and more aware that the chances of me getting to class within the first hour were slim to none; but then I heard it: the starting of a snowblower. I looked wistfully around to see if I could figure out where it was, and saw a guy walking towards me from across the street with a knowing look on his face. He didn’t say anything, but got to work getting the bulk of the snow blown away from my car (and into the street). I felt bad about the snow getting spread across a lane of (non-existent) traffic, but I got over it when it took him 5 different passes to get the bulk of the snow moved. (what took him two minutes to do would have had me there for another hour!) He said, with a smile, “that ought to help!” then headed back to his truck to put his toy away.

Life was good until I saw a massive, huge, heavy piece of construction equipment (think back-end loader or something equally as HUGE) with a super sized plow/bucket attachment headed toward my car. The driver had obviously spied the snow in the street and he was here to plow it. I rushed around making sure I had my shovel and window scraper, jumped into the car and started to maneuver myself out of the cramped and still not totally cleared out parking spot. It was tight, and took me a good dozen shifts from drive to reverse and back again, while rocking back and forth and trying to get traction. It was a mess.

Eventually I pulled out of the spot and into traffic, and it wasn’t long before I was on the clear interstate on my way to school. I pulled off my wet mittens and put on a dry pair and reached up to take my hat off.

But I wasn’t wearing a hat anymore.

It was gone. I thought perhaps I had pulled it off and thrown it in the car with the shovel, and so I crossed my fingers and checked when I got into school. It was no where to be seen.

My noro hat is MIA.

The noro I bought for it was my first ever “real” yarn purchase, and the reason I fell in love with it was because the yarn store had a simple hat knit up with the yarn. I hated to spend over $8 a pop for it, but I couldn’t leave it in the store. I loved it – I loved how the colors bled into each other, and how the blues and purples and greens all matched.

I knit that hat three times – once it was too small, and when trying to make it “bigger” on larger needles I made it so big that I ran out of yarn. The third time was the charm, and I figured out what “gauge” meant. It was warm, and I always got complements when I wore it. I just in the past few months got around to seaming it; I worked on it over the course of a few months, and unpacked it (from move #4) last fall.

It will be missed.

(I will keep my eyes peeled for what the melting snow revels, but I’m not holding my breath. The plow guy cleared my spot out and it’s obvious where I was parked this morning; I walked over and didn’t see anything except lots and lots of snow.)

I’m taking bets on when the last of the snow will be gone - as in, there is no snow anywhere outside my window; for reference it’s 18 degrees outside (in what’s left of the sun) and tonight we’ll hit a high 7 degrees. More snow is expected Friday night and we’ve been known to have April storms. (the post on why I love the northeast will appear at some point; I’m a bit bitter to try and compose it right now!)

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