Snow Day 2013 the second time around

Not a lot of snow here in the great fishbowl of Denver Colorado.

This morning I was awoken by a neighbor kid asking if I would like him to shove my sidewalk. I wasn't aware that kids still roamed neighborhoods looking for snow shoveling work. I told him, "No, I will shove it later." In part, this is true--and there was that hidden part of "I am so broke at the moment."

Of course, looking out the window right now, I am not even sure that I have to go out there and shovel. Well, at least, not the front. I still have to get the snow out of the passageway of death, that shaded section of the sidewalk that runs between the pottery studio and the house--the snow melts there, and then freezes making a passageway that only a Martian Ice Warrior can safely navigate.

So why so little snow here? Especially when up north of us, they got blizzard conditions yesterday. Well, I live in what I call the Denver Fishbowl--a small area that seems to not be completely connected to the rest of the weather in Colorado. Draw a circle on the map of Denver that includes the Denver Zoo and downtown Denver--and you have a zone that for some reason is a mini-microenvironment...it probably has something to do with the shape of the mountains to the west of us.

I have seen blizzards that nail everyone around us drop a mere inch here. Likewise I have seen severe rainstorms in the summer that only drown this area. It is like living in the fishbowl of a mad scientist...or maybe a mad weather witch.