Snowday

Ow. Someone remind me again why I bought a house instead of a condo? Yeah, yeah, faster appreciation, supposedly greater equity potential, no association fees, no smelling somebody else's nasty dinner in my own home, nobody next door banging on the wall when a game of Pit gets a bit rowdy and out of hand*, blah blah whatever. People who live in condos don't have to do the shoveling themselves when it snows six inches. People in condos get to look out the window from their warm home and watch as some burly man with a handy snow-blowing machine takes care of all that snow for them. I imagine that for those few brief moments, it's not unlike being a princess or a Hilton, sitting perched on a satin pillow all fancy-like as some lowly servant does all the hard work for you while you simply ponder what pretty little outfit to try on next.

I'm exaggerating, of course. The shoveling wasn't really all that bad tonight, though I do feel my right shoulder and lower back will be aching quite seriously tomorrow. And really, I suppose comparing condo living to a luxurious life of entitlement is stretching it more than a bit. I wouldn't have to be a princess or pay condo association fees to have someone else do the hard work for me. I'd just need to revert back to childhood.

Snow was a lot more fun when I was a child. No shoveling to do, because my dad did that. No driving in the snow, because the bus driver or my mom did that. Sometimes, of course, we even got to stay home from school because of the snow. Now, not only do I not get a snowday, but I have to drive in the crap to get to work, spend 20 minutes getting the snow off my car before I can leave, and then get to shovel it all from my driveway and sidewalk when I finally do return home for the night. How am I supposed to enjoy the pretty snow when there's all of that to contend with?

Plus, as a kid I at least had the proper footwear. I realized this morning that I really should invest in a suitable pair of boots for days such as this. Somewhere around 7th grade, it was no longer cool to wear enormous yet practical snow boots with your pants tucked inside. Dealing with wet feet and pant legs for the first two hours of the school day was far preferable to wearing the moon boots. It's been years, of course, since I actually cared about any fashion faux pas or peer pressure related to my snowgear choices, yet I still haven't owned a proper pair of snowboots in at least 17 years. I do hate the wet feet and pant legs, however, so when I looked out the window this morning and realized that my useless little ankle-high boots weren't going to cut it, I did something I felt only a little bit stupid about: I took two plastic Target bags from the recycling stash in my stairwell and I put one on each foot. I then pulled a rubber band up around each foot and secured the bags around my shins, because, apparently, if a neighbor should see me leaving my house with Target bags on my feet, I should at least be walking upright, rather than hunching downward to hold the bags up by their handles. Clearly I had my priorities in order there.

Yeah, so... snowboots. That's going on the list. Straightaway.


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* Yes, this really happened once--in my old apartment. Clearly we're a dangerous bunch, my friends and I. Some people trash hotel rooms; some people play card games too loud.