A Bad Snow Day Still Is A Snow Day

We had a snow day in which there was no snow to be had.

It wasn't the greatest of snow days to be sure.

Wednesday night, all the local Charlotte media were in high panic mode. Five to eight inches! Get ready! It's going to be a massive storm and we're going to get hit like we've not been hit before!

I made the mistake of going to a Harris Teeter grocery store on Wednesday afternoon to pick up fresh broccoli for my dinner that night. It never even crossed my mind that we were going to get snow. I was the odd man out, apparently.

As soon as I walked into the store, I realized my mistake. The place was packed, almost wall to wall with people and carts. The folks queueing up behind the check-out counters had the desperate, trapped look on their faces I've come to associate with the one I see in the mirror when I try to coax myself into believing my beard doesn't look any grayer than it did the day before. It's a losing battle.

I needed the broccoli and couldn't make the dinner I planned without it. I had to shop. But I knew it wasn't something I could do for a long time. Eventually, I reasoned, one of those poor, trapped rabbits in line there was going to flip out and begin gnawing on the other linestuffers. I hurried to the fresh produce area, but had to take a detour around dairy and bread. I heard the screams of the dead and the dying, saw the blood pooling out of the aisle and knew the carnage for what it was: The weak paving the way for the strong.

What is it with people around Charlotte, anyway? We hear there's going to be snow and suddenly milk and bread are the most important things in the universe. I saw people I know for a face are lactose intolerant and have a ciliac sensitivity buying milk and bread. They had this dazed look in their eyes as if they were't really there at all.

Once I had the broccoli, I pushed my way through the shuffling horde milling around next to the check-out counters and bulled into the general vicinity of the self-checkout areas. The line was, if anything, longer. I knew I'd have to get ugly. (Yes, all right. Fine. Uglier. Happy now?) Raising my voice, I called out, "Hey, Fred! Is that an open line down there? It is? All right, hold my place."

I didn't get two steps before I heard the rumbling of the stampede behind me. Making good use of the gazelle-like agility granted to me in times of great need by the Grand Astronomer Of The Universe thanks to the Plucked Harmonic (snow days bring it out in me. apologies.) of Hammon, I jumped up on a conveyer belt at a checkout counter, did a little dance, then hopped off after the stampede had stampeded by.

Once I checked out, I headed to the car and home.

Even after having witnessed the chaos and carnage at the Harris Teeter, I still was unconvinced that the snow would arrive. Until it started falling around 7 pm. I was out walking Buzz, The Garbage Disposal That Walks Like A Dog, when suddenly the sky opened up and little bits of cotton fluff started pelting me. The snow came down so heavy and so hard, the flakes so big and fat, that I could actually hear the flakes hitting the trees and grass.

The streets were covered in a matter of minutes and I started to believe. 

Hyper Lad, the youngest spawn of our loins, was already dancing around downstairs, confident in the universe's ability to deliver. Being young enough to enjoy it, we both headed back out into the snow with the dog and began pelting said canine with snowballs. Now, don't think us cruel. Buzz loves to have snowballs thrown at him. He tries to bite them out fo the air and, when they break apart, he snaps at all the falling pieces and then eats them.

Eventually we came in started drying off and warming up.

Yep, the snow day was going to be good.

At least, I thought it was going to be good until just around midnight when it started sleeting. It seems the storm passed to the north of us, dropping most of the snow somewhere else. Well, anywhere else that wasn't Charlotte.

And so we had a snow day in which there was no snow to be had. No snow men to be built. No snow angels to be made. Unless you made snow mermaids from splashing around in the slush.

Still, it was a day off from school for Hyper Lad. Not that we got a day off. His mother had to go into work at 10 am and I still had classwork to finish because the school I'm electronically attending is in Georgia and they have the unreasonable expectation of me doing my work when the weather is good where they are. And also because I do my work inside and not out in the snow.

A snow day without snow.

Well, I suppose there are worse things. . . 

Wouldn't you say so, Mr. Torrence?