nearly two hours...

That's how long it took me to drive back to my parent's house this afternoon after picking up my kids for the weekend at our standard meeting place. This is normally a drive that takes in the ballpark of 40 minutes to make but was considerably longer due to the March nor'easter that struck New England today. The snow started at about 13:30 (and much earlier in the day for eastern Massachusetts) when I was coming out of the Merrimack Public Library on my way to pick up V and M. Fortunately they had an early release from school today for whatever reason, so I was able to pick them up earlier than usual. The wonderful snow is supposed to cease around 10-11:00 on Saturday morning. leaving this area between 6-10" of the nasty white fluff. You have to love the inconsistency of late winter/early spring New England weather as this past Tuesday saw quite balmy temperatures in the mid 70's.

The warmer weather that we had earlier in the week allowed me to syphon a good portion of the melting snow and ice layer on top of the pool cover at my parents house. I'd estimate that pool cover was supporting at least 100 gallons of ice and water. Good thing too considering it's once again a snow covered mess.

Ten minutes extra at the Nashua Public Library this morning has cost me an additional $10. I needed to return a DVD that I had signed out of that library last week. Once I dropped my quarter into the metered library parking lot I had 30 minutes to take care of my business. Once the movie was returned I had to meander downstairs to sign into one of the library's computer rooms to feed my email addiction. But that's not what killed me. Stopping to use the restroom on my way out put me over the top. When I got back to my car I found a nice little parking ticket on my windshield from the ever efficient meter maids employed by the Nashua Police Department.

I couldn't have been much more than ten minutes longer than my time on the meter allowed. I suspect the meter maids hover over that parking lot during the day because they likely accrue a small fortune in parking fines for the city's coffers by doing so. Next time I shall either mind my time better, bring more quarters to feed the meter or just limit my time at that library to after 17:00 on weekdays or weekends, when parking in that lot is free. What I'm debating now is should I attempt to fight the ticket or just write out the check and send it off to the greedy people at City Hall.

Do any of you remember that Lion Force Voltron cartoon from 1984-85? I've been getting my kids into it again after a failed attempt this past summer. There are two collections, in blue and yellow lion tins, currently out on DVD comprising the first 30 episodes of the show and a bunch of special features with each. The third set (either red or green lion is supposed to be released n May, containing episodes 31-45). My failed attempt from the summer came on one of my few unsuccessful eBay transactions. I purchased bootleg copies of the program recorded onto 8 DVDs, most of which my player couldn't read - probably because the copies I bought were corrupted and the jerk who sold them to me probably knew it (and stated in his ad an 'all sales final, no return policy). Oh well. I haven't had many bad transactions in three years of eBay buying and selling.

Well, that's enough rambling for tonight. I'm going to go read for an hour and then go to sleep.

Ah, heck with reading before bed tonight.. I can already feel my eyes getting heavy... zzzzzzz

We did actually get about 10" of the white fluffy stuff - before it turned to rain and made the snow into wet, heavy, hard to shovel, half frozen slush. For those of you living in the northern states, you know what I'm talking about. For those of you living in the southern states, you're lucky you missed the mess! Though I must comment that, just this past Tuesday, we had temperatures that topped out around 75. Hopefully, spring is on the way in more ways than just on the calendar.