Ice

[melissajm]

When they said "Ice storm warning," they weren't kidding...
Tech Support and I woke up to that dark, muffled silence of an electronic world unplugged, broken by the gunshot cracks of ice-laden tree limbs breaking. The sun rose on beautiful devastation: a blue silk sky over a glittering crystal world. The beloved birch tree in our front yard looks like a bowed, weeping, diamond-haired angel. At least 2 large branches are cracked off. It's battered from a past ice storm already. We hope it'll spring back. Tech Support spent the morning hauling downed branches, and his coat's stained from pine pitch. (anyone know how to get out, not the pitch itself, but the stains it leaves?)

We were lucky. We got power (and heat) back after 2-3 hours, and the house and cars are fine. My dad, at his camp up north, has to shovel 6" of snow. Their house, where my mom is, is in a State of Emergency area. She has no power. One of my sisters has no power AND standing water in her cellar. (She has a woodstove and an emergency water system, thank goodness!) I don't think the other sister has power either.

Prettiest pain in the butt ever.

Comments

[jjschwabach.livejournal.com]

Snow with some ice on top of it. I got my car sort of cleaned off, and set out, got to the end of the street and went around the block and came home. An hour and a half later, I tried again, and it was okay as long as you stuck to 40. Then I got into town (that's The Big City, Bath) and it was awful again. At one of the main intersections, people were treating it like a 4-way stop, even though there are lights and they were working. The intersection itself was a maze of slush and icy ridges.

About 2/3 of the regular staff made it in to work.

[melissajm.livejournal.com]

My boss made it in, but he said there was no one else in the unit and told me to stay home. We had no light, no heat, it was still dark...So I did.