Snow day!

Monday, February 21, 2011

BINGHAMTON, NY — This morning when we got up, we looked out on a winter wonderland! A thick blanket of snow muffled our truck and trailer, and after the plow passed around it, there was a tidy white wall of snow around them. In a place where the average snowfall is three inches in February, we got seven to ten. Just lucky, I guess! We had no difficulty deciding to stay put for another day.
With only a pair of loafer-style winter shoes, I was ill equipped to trudge through the big drifts at the side of the road on the way to Friendly’s for breakfast. So I went behind Val and put my feet in his footsteps – like the poor man following Good King Wenceslas in the Christmas carol! However, heat was not in the very sod, and my feet got cold and wet.
We decided to see what we could find in the mall across the street from the hotel – uncertain if it was even open on Presidents’ Day, which is today. But it was, so we looked for a place that sold boots. As we entered the mall, we passed a parking lot for strollers, where we saw several winter jackets draped over the stands. I thought it unusual that there should be so many lost jackets, in winter, in one mall. It wasn’t until we walked a bit further that we realized a number of people were keeping fit by mall-walking, and they had no qualms about leaving their outdoor wear unattended while they did so!
We found a pair of nice boots for me at Sears, which were comfy and warm and sported a very reasonable price tag. The real surprise came at the cash register, when I went to pay and found they were going at half that reasonable price, making them a real steal! Hooray for Presidents’ Day sales! I’m delighted with them, and put them to the test several times today.
We cleared off the truck as best we could, and Val managed to borrow a snow shovel to clear the drifts around the wheels where the plow had passed. Val wanted to move the rig around the corner to a cleared section of the parking lot before everything froze solid – and to let the staff clear the spot where we had been. With the four-wheel drive, there was no trouble getting going, fortunately.
The rest of the day was pretty lazy; surfing the net...reading...napping. Tough stuff. The weather channel tells us tomorrow should be much better, so we should be hitting the road again in the morning.