Happy Lunar New Year!
A prosperous Year of the Rat to all.
You know, Tuesday when my shift at work was to start there weren't enough babies to justify my being there. Yesterday? With ice and snow in the morning commute and more ice and snow from mid-afternoon? Full house. I walked out into snow falling like rain and a sizzle sound in the air and a sudden bright spark like something shorting out and I thought shit the wires!!! before the thunder shook the ground. Gah. So took myself to dinner at the little Italian eatery a block from work, that's usually fairly empty but which last night was packed with other Orphans of the Storm. And had two glasses of wine with dinner and walked home. Subways take forever on nights like this.
Thus today I hurt from walking home and a little from, well, 'not acting appropriate to my age.' (Can never find anything Woxin-related when I need it, like that discussion of Helu's behaviour. ETA: Oh there we are. 爲老不尊 act-old-not-uhh dignified/ with honour?) See, when you shovel in TO, what you need as well as a shovel (but often instead of a shovel) is an ice chopper, which is an iron hoe-like blade (roughly semi-circular, straight-edged) fixed shovel-like to a wooden pole. They do make them with metal poles as well, but they r dum. Metal poles judder all up your arm any time you chop down. Further, you don't need to actually *chop* if you're dealing with packed-down snow on top of a wet sidewalk. Clear a small patch of pavement, insert edge of chopper at base line, and shove. The snow will come up in satisfying tile-like segments. (If there are small children around they can be set to picking them up to make igloos with. Fun times for all.)
This is what I was doing for 90 minutes yesterday morning, with much energy and bravado, being Ling Gufu thrusting his dauntless spear into the ranks of Wu. Err, yes. And I sort of overdid the Ling Gufuing because my tennis-elbow-prone elbows are a little annoyed at me today. Fortunately or un-, the snow out there now is firmly wedded to the sidewalk. One can flatten it out but not remove it, so no Heroes of Yue today.
You know, Tuesday when my shift at work was to start there weren't enough babies to justify my being there. Yesterday? With ice and snow in the morning commute and more ice and snow from mid-afternoon? Full house. I walked out into snow falling like rain and a sizzle sound in the air and a sudden bright spark like something shorting out and I thought shit the wires!!! before the thunder shook the ground. Gah. So took myself to dinner at the little Italian eatery a block from work, that's usually fairly empty but which last night was packed with other Orphans of the Storm. And had two glasses of wine with dinner and walked home. Subways take forever on nights like this.
Thus today I hurt from walking home and a little from, well, 'not acting appropriate to my age.' (Can never find anything Woxin-related when I need it, like that discussion of Helu's behaviour. ETA: Oh there we are. 爲老不尊 act-old-not-uhh dignified/ with honour?) See, when you shovel in TO, what you need as well as a shovel (but often instead of a shovel) is an ice chopper, which is an iron hoe-like blade (roughly semi-circular, straight-edged) fixed shovel-like to a wooden pole. They do make them with metal poles as well, but they r dum. Metal poles judder all up your arm any time you chop down. Further, you don't need to actually *chop* if you're dealing with packed-down snow on top of a wet sidewalk. Clear a small patch of pavement, insert edge of chopper at base line, and shove. The snow will come up in satisfying tile-like segments. (If there are small children around they can be set to picking them up to make igloos with. Fun times for all.)
This is what I was doing for 90 minutes yesterday morning, with much energy and bravado, being Ling Gufu thrusting his dauntless spear into the ranks of Wu. Err, yes. And I sort of overdid the Ling Gufuing because my tennis-elbow-prone elbows are a little annoyed at me today. Fortunately or un-, the snow out there now is firmly wedded to the sidewalk. One can flatten it out but not remove it, so no Heroes of Yue today.