Well, we barely survived the wrath of Leon here on the coast. Schools, businesses, and bridges were closed on many of the islands and surrounding towns. We were urged to stay off the roads. A white-like substance fell from the skies. In fact, the winds were so strong I thought our house was going to be knocked off its pilings. Our outdoor furniture blew all over our property.
Okay, the wind part might have been a major slight exaggeration. Actually, that’s just a chair that blew over earlier in the week that I forgot to put upright again.
Well, here is about the extent of it. The Yankees would call it slush. Some Southerners who’ve lived on the coast their whole lives, including Baby-girl, would and did call it snow. This morning, I woke to cries of “Ooh, it’s snowing!†coming from her room.
My heart goes out to all the Atlanta residents who were trapped in miserable road conditions. We got the ever-elusive snow day; they got gridlock on a nightmarish scale. And let’s just say that those stories of schools in various parts of the South where students were stuck overnight with teachers supervising have left me terrorized. I love my students, but spending the night on the cold, hard, germ-laden floor with paper towels for bedding would very likely do me in.
Forgive me, but I have to end with my favorite “weather-related incident†of Winter Storm Leon. It’s just too precious not to share with those of you who haven’t already seen it. Apparently, Jim Cantore, meteorologist extraordinaire, was live and on location in Charleston, SC and was…, well, subjected to whatever this was.
It’s inexcusable, I know, and just plain idiotic on Braveheart-wanna-be’s part (Did you catch the battle cry?). And kudos to Cantore for handling it as well as one can handle these sorts of oddities. I can only imagine what I would have done; I’d probably have screamed like a banshee as he approached and then beat him senseless with my microphone when he started to leave. Seriously, what was he thinking?
But it just goes to show you that few things beat being live and on location.