SNOW!!!! And Snow! And snow. and snow......

A little over a week ago, Birmingham was all a buzz with the news that the city would be getting snow. So much snow, in fact, that many people began to refer to the storm that was to come our way as "The Blizzard of 2011". Everyone ran to the grocery store and stocked up on bread and milk. Yeah...I don't really get it either, but apparently it's just what us Southerners do when the word "snow" appears in the 10-day weather forecast. Being from the Gulf Coast, the frenzy reminded me a lot of the frenzy that occurs before a hurricane makes landfall. Colby and I got ourselves prepared for the snow storm, and by the time the snow started on Sunday afternoon, we were totally hunkered down. Actually, Colby heard about the snow several days beforehand, so he had been hunkered down for a while.



The temperature on Sunday was right at the freezing mark, so what fell from the sky Sunday afternoon and evening alternated between sleet and snow. When I went to bed Sunday night, nothing much had accumulated. But I expected to wake up on Monday morning to a beautiful winter wonderland. After all, you can't have a blizzard without snow, right?! So when I woke up on Monday morning, I ran outside to the backyard and this is what I saw:



No snow. Only ice. Apparently I live far enough south of Birmingham that I didn't get any of the snow that the rest of Birmingham got. Ice just isn't as cool as snow, but I took some pictures of it anyway.

















Basically the most disappointing blizzard ever.

The thing about ice, as I now know, is that it makes for difficult--if not impossible--travel. On Monday, the entire city of Birmingham was basically shut down because all of the roads were covered in ice. Of course, the hospitals were up and running. But I lucked out last week because I was doing a bit of a different job at the hospital that was not considered "essential". Never have I been so happy to be considered "non-essential"! Some of my co-workers were not so lucky and ended up being snowed in at the hospital for 3 days. They have all been nominated for CCN Impressive Persons of the Century!

So anyway, Monday was a Snow Day for me. By Monday afternoon, after being stuck in the house for a full 24 hours, Colby and I developed a severe case of cabin fever.



To combat this cabin fever, I bundled myself and Colby up and we took a walk around the neighborhood. I say that we took a "walk", but really it was a "slide" through the neighborhood. That's another thing I've learned about ice--it's incredibly hard to walk on. But by some miracle, Colby and I both managed to keep our feet on the ground the whole time.

On Tuesday, I decided that the icy roads would not stop me from getting out of the house and going to work. As soon as I felt that it was somewhat safe to be on the road, I left my house for the first time in 2 days. I don't remember a whole lot from that drive because I was so focused on the road, but I do seem to recall having a tight grip on the steering wheel the whole time, and white knuckles. The drive wasn't too bad, but I had no clue what to expect. The drive home that evening proved to be a bit more of a challenge, as both of the ways that I know how to get home from work were closed because the roads were still covered in ice. Fortunately, I found my way home and made it there safely.

The rest of the week, the high temperatures were in the 30s, and the lows went down to the teens. Thus, the ice stuck around for a while. In addition, Tuesday and Wednesday brought some additional short periods of snow and ice. Four days in a row of snow and ice...crazy!! Life went on and people went back to work despite the icy roads, but the week was definitely a far cry from normal. Finally, this weekend the temps got back above the 30s, and most of the ice has melted. Life is finally getting back to normal...

One of my friends posted this picture on Facebook last week, and I think it is a pretty accurate description of this past week: