Main entrance ~ update on the storm

 

Went downstairs in the afternoon, to get a better idea of how much snow had fallen. Didn’t expect this though! Apparently nobody has been in our out the building all day.

Was thinking about Iceland…

During yesterday’s blizzard, I was thinking about Iceland. Or perhaps, any little windswept island — what it would be like to live there when the winds are howling like they were yesterday.

One thought led to another, and I was reminiscing my trip to Sweden last year. Had my usual stop-over in Iceland.  As soon as the aircraft began to descend, I gazed eagerly out the little window, as I wanted to take in as much as I possibly could of the Icelandic scenery that I love.

When the airfield came into sight, I was stunned — it was blueish purple!!! At first I didn’t get it … I couldn’t make out what it was, or what they’d done to it, but when we were just about to touch down, I saw it! The whole field was totally covered by lupines!!! It was amazing and I wish I’d been able to take that picture, but now it only resides in my memory.

In fact, I think last year must have been the year of the Lupines! Never have I’ve seen them blooming that intensely or being that numerous!

wild winter weather

So, the blizzard is still upon us. Midnight, last night, we got some flurries, and when I got up, briefly, around 3 o’clock in the morning, it was in full swing. Then I could still see a few cars at the local coffee shop, though.

When I got up ‘for real’ this morning, there was no water. This is not totally uncommon in this building, so at first I didn’t think much of it, but as I checked Twitter, I realized it was a big water main that was broken and it affected a large portion of the city. Sent some thoughts to the city crews that were out there, in blizzard conditions, working to have this fixed. Later today, I’ve seen pictures in the news, of Rothesay Avenue, where it happened and it looked more like a river than a, normally busy, street.

The water came back quickly, and at the same time I received a text message that we’re under a boil order. Understandable … it’s still brownish.

Took an iPhone photo out the window, but that didn’t do justice to this magnificent storm and neither did the other ones I took outside the main entrance later one with the real camera. I find it a little difficult to capture the full power of it, but these two I found half decent.

I don’t know how much snow we’ve got today and it’s still snowing. It’s hard to tell as it’s blowing so hard. When did they start to name winter storms, by the way?! I’ve never seen that until now, with this Nemo.

UPDATE: http://money.cnn.com/2013/02/08/news/companies/naming-nemo/index.html?iid=HP_River

there’s a blizzard comin’ on

Checking the news this morning, the upcoming blizzard seems to be on top of everyone’s mind on this side of the continent … and rightly so — it’s a major storm … or two storms really, merging around Boston somewhere.

Last night, before going to bed, we watched a Boston news channel, stores were open all night and people were stocking up on foods and water. The line-ups were incredible! Some gas stations are already sold out.

Here, we’re under a blizzard warning, but it won’t start snowing until late this evening … perhaps around 9 o’clock. Don’t know how hard hit we’ll be here, but I have a feeling Nova Scotia will get it worse. In NYC it has already started to snow, I just read.

We’ve lived here, in this building, for four and half year now, and had ONE, short, power outage. That wasn’t due to weahter, they’d been digging outside and hit something. When we lived in Quebec, in the house, we got the occasional outage, though. I had a number to the hydro company, that I used to call. An automated voice told me which address I was calling from and what time the power would be back. I was pretty impressed with that! 🙂

Reading this word «blizzard» over and over again, only reminds me of a song from my childhood. I learned the lyrics by heart at an early stage and still remember them. Nowadays, I can hardly listen to it without tearing up…

Stay safe, my friends.