Blizzard Update: The Aftermath

Wow, this has been incredible! We woke up to find another foot of snow had fallen overnight, bringing the total depth (as measured on our relatively drift-free deck) to 29 inches. According to the Denver Post this is the 8th biggest Denver blizzard on record. As happy as I am, I'm afraid I'm ruined for all other snow storms. Here's a little before and after comparison:





Below is a photo montage, a day in the blizzardy life of Ferg if you will. Click on any photo to go to my flickr photo album. I've got nearly 50 pics from the last two days.

This is what we found when we opened our front door. Yes, those are garbage cans buried up to their necks!

Spencer bravely blazed a trail across the yard. Good luck finding the ball, buddy.

It was a social event as all the neighborhood came out for en mass driveway shoveling.


Makes me want to throw a BBQ party.

Most people that tried to go anywhere found their cars stuck after a few feet. We didn't bother driving today, and instead explored the neighborhood on snow shoes. I learned that even with snow shoes you will still sink up to your knees in fresh powder. Freakin' exhausting.

Once the sun came out the landscape was breathtaking.

We spent the afternoon sledding with some neighbor girls. It was a blast!


As a bonus, if you'd like to experience our Colorado blizzard just click on this link for a brief video I found on youtube. The wind wasn't quite this bad at our house, but it's close enough.

Bittersweet Holiday Blizzard of '06

Welcome back to Deep Thoughts by Fergie! Hard to believe it's been almost a year to the day since my last post. Well anyone who's not living in cave has probably heard about the aptly named "Holiday Blizzard" dumping massive amounts of snow on the entire square state of Colorado. It never ceases to amaze me how these things start off so benignly, showing up as a solitary "40% chance of snow" blip a week out on the weather channel forecast. Who'd have known that it would turn into such a beast? I threw a minor hissy fit when the meteorologists forecast snow to start on Tuesday, yet repeated checks yielded only a bright sunny sky. Not a single cloud! Who are they kidding? But like magic, when I woke Wednesday morning there was a heavy dusting of snow and the skies showed no sign of relenting. In fact, once at work we watched it continue to fall furiously thick outside our office window. So much snow was due to fall that management ordered every Denver based Lockheed Martin facility to be shutdown by 1:00. Salaried employees were given a special "Natural Disaster" charge number; we contractors were not so lucky. (Except that we were mandated a day off, so I can't really complain!)

While the boys at work frantically tried to plan out which roads were still open so they could get in prime position to hit the slopes first thing tomorrow, Steve and I concentrated on just getting home. Luckily the plows were out in force so the commute wasn't terrible. I know it seems like all my posts lately have been pictures of our snowy yard, but I can't resist. It's so exciting to have the ordinary world transformed into a wonderland with just a sprinkle of precipitation. And WOW, what a doozy was this one!




I got my wish which was snow beyond my wildest dreams. It came at a cost, though, because the Denver Airport is shut down until Thursday evening, dashing our plans of flying out to New York to see Steve's parents, and brother and sister-in-law for the holidays. We tried to reschedule but were too late, and in the end we opted to cancel this trip instead of arriving at midnight on Christmas Day for a severely truncated visit. We'll be sure to make it up to them later in the year. Guess we'll have to put this new snow to some good use in the meantime.