WOW! The weather forecasters here are pretty bloody good...they said we would get lots of rain earlier in the year and we had a wading pool in the basement...they said one day in the summer it would be over 100 because of the humidity and yup we were in a tunnel in a car with no air conditioning in a tunnel in the big dig....So last night we get the winter storm warning...snow about 1pm today...At 1230 I am wandering over to the Holiday Inn to meet my gal pal Christy for lunch..and the snow starts to flurry....by the time I am taking the short walk back to the hospital there is around an inch and half....I work a bit more...and leave at 3pm to go to Penguins....There is about 3 inches...And so begins crazy times....I get to the Charles MGH T stop and some little old woman literally elbowed me out of the way to get her ticket on the scanner...then I get on the escalator and in front of me is the crazy lady talking and cursing to someone the rest of us can't see...But wow the Ashmont train is pretty empty I was stunned and thrilled! Then I get to the Green Line...oh bloody hell...I wait through 3 B line trains, but there are no E line trains coming...Then he shows up...the boy who looks like he is wearing lederhosen....It is around 28 degrees outside and he has no bloody coat on...I am very glad that he is not standing near him..I look up again and he is staring intently at a pack of cards with his hand in a distinctly David Blaineish position...Then I realize...he isn't practicing card tricks he is trying to psychically guess what card is next! Then finally heaven...the E train is here! And there are only 2 cars....oh my god....how will I fit - so I just use the only Dooney & Burke as a batterring ram and I secure a small cozy space between 2 boys...who unfortunately do not look like Ben Affleck, Matt Damon or George Clooney ( sorry Dez...).During the wait for the train I have been texting my mum...The last text I sent her just before the train came was at 3.27...all about Mr Lederhosen wannabepsychic guy....next text is at 3.54pm...I am still on the train...we have stopped at every station (this is normal.....) we are still packed like sardines...actually my text is to my long suffering hubby...."I am at Northeastern - I have made lots of new very personal friends on the E line" I am not kidding...until the Symphony stop I was trapped between a seriously Voldemort look-a-like, very small Hispanic guy (he was resting his jaw on my arm......) and Asian dude in scrubs - he had a very nice bottom - I had very little choice but to feel it when the train driver kept stopping short.....The next text to my mum came at 3.58 - still at Northeastern..."am on a train to nowhere...the road is gridlocked with cars on the tracks so we are not moving" (Oh - if you are not from Boston or have never been here....the Green Line is part subway, part street car/tram...it becomes street car at Symphony and the tracks run down the middle of Huntington Ave)....Still at Northeastern at 3.59pm a text to my big brother "OMG so much fuckng snow"...4.02pm - yeah you got it still at Northeastern...a text to my hubby "OMG people r crazy - driving and walking over the train tracks.WTF its not like this was a surprise it started snowing right when they said it would!"....In the mdst of this are the cute texts from my mum....."Have u got enough food with u plus enough warm clothing? what about Robert r u anywhere near home stop so that he can come for u.? on foot"
OOPS time to come clean to mummy and tell her that we are actually meeting at the bar......"He is on another train coming 2 meet me @ Penguins. It is all quite a grand adventure. I have never been in a real proper blizzard" (this was 4.05...still at Northeastern...)...At 4.07 over an hour after I left work (I can usually get to Penguins in 20 minutes at rush hour on a Friday......) I text mum "It just seems to have brought out every idiot! It has taken me > 1 hour to go 4 miles...and I think the train driver is a learner driver" I mean at every station she had turned the bloody train off....no lights, no AC pepole packed like sardines and the MBTA wonder why there are always sexual assaults on the Green Line??????? (see above about me and the boy in scrubs with the nice arse...)...Finally we get the to the MFA stop (I still have 2 more to go....but is has cleared out now....) but it is 4.10 as I text hubby back after he asks where I am (he is already at the bar....after walking 10 mins to the orange line, riding one stop, and walking another 10 minutes...oh and it is still snowing.....)"Museum. Fckng idiot drivers are stopping on the train tracks have been on the E for 45 minutes..." quickly followed by the missive to mum at 4.13 (still at Museum) "At least peoiple have started getting off. I have never seen so much snow in my whole life...what a hoot. I could've done without farty old man when we were all up close and personal" (let me tell ya - old guy, with some really bad farts on a packed to the gills train.....UUURRRGGGHHHHHH). I was at this point enjoying having a seat finally, but the nice quiet girl next to me left and I inherited the tiny Chinese girl with the 3 bags of groceries and the awful cough....so to my mum...""At least I am almost there...oh no the driver turned the engine off again and I have the consumptive Chinese girl next to me" Seriously her cough sounded so consumptive and she was sooooo frail...And then she is talking onthe phone to her boyfriend/hubby/signif other...and saying how she had was so sick but had missed her doctors appointment...so I text mum again and we are stil not even at Longwood and it is 4.16..."Oh great and she is talking about how sick she is with her horrid cough...FABULOUS" We do make it to Longwood though...just one more stop and the insane, consumptive girl is now telling whoever she is talking to and I qoute her word for word here and am not being racist in any way"Why snow cause so much problem anyway" I am so sorry it doesn't bloody snow where you live in China but this has now been around 6 inches in 4 hours on a very busy day in one of the busiest parts of town GET OVER IT!!!!.... But we are almost at Brigham Circle...I am nearly there BUT then we stop right outside the Harvard School of Public Health ....and the driver says "Due to the weather conditions everyone must get off here...this train is going no further..." So I trudge to the bar, wishing I had worn my wellies instead of the "sexy boots" and even that I had tucked my skinny jeans into the "sexy boots"...I am relatively dry because of my waxed jacket, but I forgot my scarf this morning and the snow is dry powder blowing down my neck.....But like a beacon in the night there is Penguins, there is warmth and my hubby, and Pam and Yanna and my lovely pint of Stella.....
We have a couple of beers and a bite to eat and trudge off in the snow - this was a pretty awesome cardio work out by the way......Get home ....call mum and let her know that "Nanook of the North and her hubby made it home...then we let the pups out to play......they had so much fun....I trudged up to the drugstore for a prescription...and as cheesy as it sounds a hot water bottle...Seriously if my feet are cold I can't sleep.....And now it is 9.48 pm....and still snowing...last check in the neighbors (they live in Shanghai) yard where the virgin snow is was 10.5 inches.....and I have to go to work tomorrow...
