Flakey!

Snow, glorious snow! Thick, wet, heavy snow - good for packing, weighty for shoveling, sloppy for walking or driving. The kind of snow that sticks to vertical signposts and coats all the tree limbs until they look like some glittery, twisted wedding cake ornaments.

Apparently, the weather front twitched, moving about fifty miles farther north than expected, changing our snow totals from maybe three inches to almost six. Since this is the first significant snowfall this season, a few reminders are warranted:

• For heaven's sake, brush the snow off the roof of your car. Having snow chucks fly off your roof while at freeway speeds is dangerous to the cars behind you. If you are too lazy to walk around the car so you can clean off the entire roof, invest the nine bucks in a van brush; you can reach the entire roof from one side of the car.
• Four wheel drive? Slow down. While 4WD is a great help plowing through the piles and ridges of snow in an intersection, it will do nothing if there is ice under that snow. Four wheel drive does not make you accident proof.
• Drive for the conditions. That means slow down. While you may be winter-driving certified and more than capable of handling your vehicle at speed through six inches or more of snow, chances are the people around you are not. Your weaving around them at faster than the prevailing speeds may well cause an accident.
• On the other hand, don't drive too slowly. If you insist on driving fifteen miles under the speed limit (and ten under what everyone around you is doing), please have the courtesy to move to the rightmost lane. All the way into that lane, not into the half-and-half position.

In honor of the snow, I'll use the winter dishes tonight, break out the hot chocolate and light the fire. After dinner, unpacking a few boxes of books in front of the fire (with more hot chocolate) sounds like a glorious way to spend a snowy evening. Have to enjoy it now, as the temps the next few days guarantee this will all melt by Monday.