Take this shovel and shove it

One of the last things that Jason did for me before departing our sunny (though not so warm) shores was to shovel the snow from the driveway and footpath. It was a nice gesture that of course lasted all of about 48 hours before it decided to snow again. I didn’t even bother to get rid of it.

Now when one casts an eye back over the recent weather pattern of Fort McMurray, one notes that there has been approximately 5 days that have exceeded -20C in the last 6 weeks. That means that the time spent shoveling the snow is spent in the blistering cold. Not pleasant at all.

So imagine my joy when I am sitting at work the other day and here that there’s a snow warning, with a possible 10-20cm overnight and a temperature in the order of -26C. I just love it when they give you a forecast for an overnight low of -26C with a high the following day of -28C. Since when is the high less than the low I ask you? Its just bloody wrong!

But getting back to the point (yes, there’s always a point eventually) when I woke up in the morning, it wasn’t quite as bad as I’d feared. There’d only been 10 cm of snow overnight. Of course, I wasn’t ready to shovel so I just drove over the bloody stuff and decided to leave it until later. Later turned out to be that night, after having had all four kids at Thomas’ indoor soccer game whilst Caroline managed to get out for dinner.

As I shoveled away, there were a few things that came to mind. There was the fact that every time that I go out to shovel the snow at night, my neighbours are out there shoveling too. That could make for comradely spirit, but the fact that there’s two of them doing half the work that I have to do just rubs me the wrong way. That’s probably mostly because every time they shovel the snow, they pile it on the road, rather than on their property. Everyone else in the street keeps it on their property in accordance with the by-laws but these guys seem to be oblivious. If everyone did it, there’d be nowhere to drive and nowhere to park. So there’s a small chance that I take just a little bit too much pleasure in hefting the snow from my driveway up and over my pile onto their front lawn.

Then there was the fact that because I had ignored the first snowfall and driven over the second, there were tyre tracks of compacted snow (ie ice) on the drive. So to finish the job properly would require not just moving the snow, but getting out the ice chipper and have a good go with that as well. It brought to my mind Norm of the old Life. Be in It. Campaigns from Australian telly. As I contemplated whether I should be getting the ice chipper out or not, the theme of those ads (is near enough good enough) rang in my ears, “What if the Great Wall [of China] had only been a great fence?”

So I grabbed the chipper and started the process of removing the ice from the driveway. But as the tingling commenced in the ears and I tried to remember whether I was supposed to have feeling in my cheeks or not, I decided that Norm could get stuffed and just maybe if the Great Wall had been a Great Fence, they wouldn’t have ended up with so many dead people in the foundations!

At least the temperature is supposed to get to single figure minuses tonight. Because let’s face it, there’s more snow on the way too. Shovelling it should only be half as bad at -5 as it is at -26!!