Mini-apocalypse
Yesterday, the day before I left town, Philadelphia got nailed by the worst storm I've ever been through. It came out of nowhere. One minute it was 95 degrees and sunny, the next it had completely clouded over, hail was falling, and 60 mph winds (or so the news later said) were whipping through the city. And then, almost as suddenly, it was gone. When I walked through the park 10 minutes later, the farmer's market vendors were still there, stunned, soaked, and hiding under their canopies. They hadn't even managed to pack up their veggies in time.
My neighborhood was trashed. Branches everywhere, and a number of trees, some of them very old, knocked down and pulled out by the roots. They tore up the sidewalk on their way down. The very center of Penn campus looked, well, like a hurricane hit it. It'll literally be years before some of that grows back.
If you're superstitious, that's a very ambiguous omen to begin a trip on. It's not an obviously negative sendoff, just a melodramatic one, sort of like Philadelphia slammed the door behind me.
Besides, it'll be a while before I see any rain again.
- homais JFK airport
My neighborhood was trashed. Branches everywhere, and a number of trees, some of them very old, knocked down and pulled out by the roots. They tore up the sidewalk on their way down. The very center of Penn campus looked, well, like a hurricane hit it. It'll literally be years before some of that grows back.
If you're superstitious, that's a very ambiguous omen to begin a trip on. It's not an obviously negative sendoff, just a melodramatic one, sort of like Philadelphia slammed the door behind me.
Besides, it'll be a while before I see any rain again.
- homais JFK airport