Another February snowfall

Eleven days ago, the Groundhog who holds jurisdiction over Seattle emerged from his burrow, looked around, and said, "Well, no shadow.  Cool.  I wasn't in any mood to go back to sleep anyway.  Let the wild and crazy Springtime begin."

That's what he said to the press.  I suspect he had other thoughts.  Secret plans.

The weatherman warned us.  But once more, like Charlie Brown trying to kick a football, I placed my trust in the wrong person.  Or rodent.  I woke up this morning to a world of whiteness.  I measured eight inches on my back deck, which may or may not be a good place to measure.  By evening, I measured eleven inches.

I'll get back to the Groundhog issue, but let me say that I love snow.  I love it even when it causes inconvenience.  Admittedly, I live in a city that gets only an occasional snowfall.  The confluence of warm, damp air off the Pacific and dry, cold Arctic air masses has to be aligned just perfectly.  Otherwise we get a cold, dry spell, or -- more commonly -- a lot of rain.

This was my cats' first snow.  You can imagine their fear and loathing when they looked out the window to see the view utterly transformed, right?  Ha!  I had barely opened the door, wielding my ruler for a measurement, before they had slipped past me and disappeared in a cloud of dry snow.  They reveled.  They rejoiced.  They chased each other.  Honestly, they're such kids.  (Actually, I calculate their age in cat years as about 13, so their behavior should have been expected.)

They've been in and out the cat door all day, dashing in only long enough to dry off a bit and grab a mug of hot chocolate and an occasional sweet roll.  (I anthropomorphize shamelessly.)

I'm a bit older than thirteen, so I spent the morning drinking coffee, staring out the windows, and fortifying myself with cereals and bagels.  Finally, I pulled on hiking boots and went out for a walk.  Unlike some years, the beauty of  this morning's snow never dissolved in above-freezing daytime temperatures.  The temperature stayed below freezing all day, and the snow just kept piling up.

I went on a long walk down my Montlake avenue, dodging neighbors with dogs and teenagers on cross-country skis, and crossed over into the Arboretum.  I did a long walk through the park, eventually doubling back to my house.  I guess it wasn't all that long a walk, but a slower walk than usual, slogging through ankle-deep snow, even though the snow had been trampled down by other walkers.

The walk was beautiful.  In places, tracks through the Arboretum reminded me of portions of ski trails I'd been on, at least from the perspective of scenic views.  Although the going was slower and more arduous than if I'd been gliding along on skis.

But let me return to the question of the Groundhog.  Two years ago, Mr. Hog also predicted an early spring.  The day after his prediction, we had a snowfall almost identical to this year's.  I commented in this very blog, as the snowpocalypse continued to February 4 and beyond:

And so, at about 10:30 a.m., I laced up my hiking boots, put on an aging ski jacket, slipped on some gloves, and headed out into the chilly (26 degrees) out of doors. One look at my car, a formless white snowball, had already told me that I wouldn't be driving anywhere for lunch, which gave me a ready-made excuse to hike two miles through the snow to University Village.

I could have said the same this year, except that the pandemic means no restaurant lunch, and adding a mask to my wardrobe.

This is the only other explicit betrayal by Mr.Hog of which I have a record.  But I note in my blog posts commemorating equally impressive snowfalls on February 9, 2014, and February 5, 2017.  The post-Hog days of early February seem to invite major snowfalls.  Someone should look into it.

But come when they may, I love the snow.  This year, however, I'm scheduled to receive my long-awaited second dose of Pfizer Covid-19 vaccine on Tuesday at 9:10 a.m.  I've been worrying that the streets will still be blocked by snow drifts, but the temperature is predicted to rise into the 40s by Monday, and the snow turn to rain.  I'll be sorry to see the snow disappear so quickly.

But I'd be sorrier to miss getting my shot.