The Great Snow of 2005? NOT!!!

Once again the weathermen in the Washington, DC area worked the community into a frenzied activity, causing people to empty store shelves, cancel school (for two days) and leave work early or not come in at all, for a snow that was almost a non-event.

It has been warm in the area lately, above 40 and often above 50, so when the predicted snow arrived even the places that got 6-8 inches on the ground got at most 2 inches on the roads. I will admit that after 5pm yesterday, things got slippery, and this morning before the sun came up the roads were a little slick, but by 10am, everything was clear, and most roads were dry. When I go home tonight my sunny grass will be completely bare of snow.

In early February my company put a survey on the internal community web page asking how many people thought there would be one more "blizzard" this winter. Since I don't believe we have had one, I thought the question was silly, but I also thought that it was unlikely. Today on the page I noticed a congratulations to the people who answered YES. Sorry, but if this is the big snow of 2005, some people need to go and live in New England or the Midwest for a few months. Get a grip!

Do it yourself medicine?

I know why this book was written, the same reason every introductory book is written, as a reference for new practitioners. But somehow, this one seems more distressing than Step by Step Auto Repair or Step by Step Deck Construction. Perhaps the only title more distressing would be a book called Step by Step Brain Surgery!

Step by Step MRI.

Blog complaints -- or too much Judaism

My daughter says my blog posts are getting too religious, or too spiritual, or too Jewish. So I figured my next one would be cute and funny. What do you do when cute, or funny, or "oh get a life" also turns out to have a Jewish bent. You post it anyway!

The Washington Post publishes an Express version, given away free at Metro stations. On the front page of today's Express was the following item.

Gum Sin-A-Burst "Your gum has lost its flavor but there's no trash can in sight. What do you do? According to a prominent Israeli rabbi's interpretation of Jewish law, swallow it. Shmuel Eliyahu ruled spitting gum on a sidewalk or hiding it under a desk is wrong. 'Gum cannot be thrown where others are liable to be disgusted by it,' he said -- and though gum may appear hidden, 'G-d knows' where it is. Better yet, eschew gum altogether. 'Chewing gum is the practice of lower forms of life,' added Eliyahu." (AP)

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/express/pdfs/EXPRESS_02222005.pdf