The Snow Has Begun to Fall

Annie's Log, 1/16/16:

In the immortal words of Ned Stark, Lord of Winterfell:

Actually, it's already here. In Syracuse, at least. Kind of.

Let me explain.

While I was driving back up to the Great White North, I was able to watch the temperature drop and the snow rise with each state I passed through. It was like walking through the Wardrobe into Narnia over the course of 11.5 hours. Magical, if slightly tedious.

Leaving the relative warmth of the South in exchange for what was surely going to be the death of me (if I didn't turn into a Yeti first) was difficult but necessary, and eventually worthwhile, for when I got to Syracuse, there were inches of snow on the ground. Inches!

It was like Christmas, except it felt more like Christmas (it was like 70 degrees in Wake Forest on December 25th this year).

Then all the snow melted the next day because it was 40 degrees outside. I actually heard someone say that it was "hella warm outside" at that time, which, comparatively speaking, I guess was true.

The next day there was rain but no snow, which led to ice but still no snow.

And then there was Sunday. Sunday was the culmination of days of "Lake Effect Snow Warnings" (when I asked a local what exactly that meant, she just laughed and said "It's coming, don't bother trying to be prepared."). Sunday was the beginning of my own personal Arctic adventure.

At approximately 2130 hours, the flurries started. By 2200 hours, the snow was in full blast. I went outside and built a tiny snowman to celebrate.

On the way back up to my apartment after building the tiny snowman in the parking lot, I heard a girl say, "Somebody tell Ned Stark that winter finally showed up!"

At 0830 hours the next morning, I received a text message from my boss at work telling me to stay home because our scheduled "staff development day" had been cancelled. At this point, the snow was still falling heavily and I rolled over and went back to bed.

When I woke up,  at 0945, it was Siberia outside. 18 degrees, but it felt like 1 degree with the wind chill. That's one, singular degree. One. Uno. Ein. Un. And then it chilled out for a little while (get it? "Chilled" out?), before starting up again even more ferociously at 1630. And that's where I am now.

In my room, in fuzzy socks with a  mug of hot chocolate and homemade chicken noodle soup in my fridge. I have winter boots and thick socks and fluffy scarves and hopefully that'll be enough to get me through to March.

End log.