Winter

Snow Me

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This winter has forced me to confront a disturbing reality that has caused my delicate psyche a crushing blow: Winter in Boston Sucks!

Boston Strong has taken a beating from the unrelenting perseverance of Mother Nature, who is engaged in a vulgar display of vanity: the chance to establish a personal record for snowfall. Boston is inches away from achieving an infamous honor that has inflicted pain, Arctic Blast inspired agoraphobia and nerve-racking tests of driving skill manufactured by snow banks that have narrowed already narrow streets.

Simply put, this winter has been the Tough Mudder of winters.

I can personally attest to the punishment absorbed by my body. My hamstrings are constantly sore and my lower back is tighter than the on street parking situation in the North End. Shoveling one prodigious snowfall after another has forced me into a rigorous workout regimen that has forced me to evolve into a squatting, lifting, bend at the knees and not with your back, throw pounds of snow over ten-feet high existing snow mounds and complete all of this with a single shovel.

I am spent. I am a Ronda Rousey MMA opponent. I submit.

I am weak and powerless against this bitch. Every fiber of my being is attuned to the prospect of any and all types of precipitation falling from the haughty skies above New England. I check the weather forecast like a farmer in Iowa. I tend to the driveway as if it was rich soil capable of sprouting a bounteous harvest of asphalt. Salt is a weapon and an ally. Ice, black ice, icicles equal in size to the ivory tusks of an elephant hang with malice from the gutters, and patiently sitting above our heads is a snow-laden roof injected with the performance-enhancing effects of ice.

Israel is worried about Iran with nuclear weapons. I have a fucking shovel, a snow rake and some salt against this beast called Mother Nature. Yes, I have raked snow from the roof – not once – but twice. Raking the snow off the roof has aggravated a shoulder/clavicle injury caused by a feeble attempt to start the snow blower last winter. I yanked the snow blower’s cord and the cord refused to budge, but my shoulder released a searing pain that almost brought me to my knees.

I can’t take it anymore. Shoveling the little bit that fell last night put me into a fugue this morning. I probably didn’t need to shovel the small amount that fell, but my brain and body are on high alert to oppose snow and ice.

Vikings

I have become a Viking warrior. The shovel is my sword and battle axe. My shovel has been awarded a place of honor and respect on the porch. And don’t think of placing your shitty shovel near mine or describe feats of derring-do by your snow blower. You have a guy that plows your driveway – my shovel and I disdain your bourgeois Barcalounger ass.

Okay, the neighbor has used his Bobcat and snow blower to clear out the front of the driveway and sidewalk a few times. My shovel and I do accept help. And we will work for food.

Pumping Iron: Arnold & Franco

If there is a glimmer of light, my upper body could be a stand-in for Franco Columbo’s chiseled frame in Pumping Iron. My traps and pecs have been forged by an icy crucible that would have made weak the members of The Night’s Watch. The abs are another thing, but trust me on the traps and pecs.

 Typing this long my shoulder is rebelling. My back screams for a reputable chiropractor.

The Iceman Cometh.

Making A Left in Massachusetts

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Allstate Corp. (ALL) came out with its annual ranking of automobile accident prone cities, and drivers in Boston and Worcester, Massachusetts, topped the list. Living in Massachusetts, there is no denying that the drivers of Eastern and Central Massachusetts are complete morons. Each day there is something new and aberrant on the road that your driver’s ed teacher never instructed you to do.

Worcester topped the list. In the Woo, on average, a driver can expect a collision every 4.3 years. In Boston, safer and saner heads prevail and motorists can expect a collision every 4.4 years. Worcester and Boston usurped perennial front-runner, Washington, D.C., which had garnered the treasured top spot for six straight years.

The Commonwealth of Massachusetts is a place that NASCAR driver Tony Stewart could call home. This is the land where the evolutionary concept of nature versus nurture has to be examined. Is the root cause of this regional malady a lack of sufficient and competent driver’s education instructors or is there a recalcitrance to Massachusetts drivers that is beyond the realm of reason?

This is a part of the country where Masshole is invoked proudly. Where else do drivers routinely make left turns cutting off oncoming traffic and then give a pandering hand wave to the car that could have t-boned it? Only in Masshole Nation does this happen.

To provide an example, when a Masshole is pulling out of Dunkin’s after receiving an adipose injection of Coolatta or Iced Coffee, our Bay State motorist will plant her car in the lane of oncoming traffic to make a left.That’s right, the proper way to make a left turn out of a parking lot is to block traffic from the nearest lane and then force your way into the other lane. This is standard practice and nothing that is deemed weird or abnormal. The pandering hand wave is usually performed by a woman – who does not care – that she stopped the forward progress of five cars to make a left.

Want to take a left at a red light? If you’re the first car in line, gun your engine because you are expected to beat the car facing you and looking to go straight. Did your driver’s ed teacher instruct you to yield?  Fuck that bullshit. No Masshole worth his Dunk’s keychain is going to abide by that nonsense. Get a slow start off the line and expect a fusillade of car horns rebuking your familiarity with the rules of the road.

Making that lane change – only pussies signal.

The speed limit reads 65 mph. Either rev it up to 75 mph or get off the road.

Respect the bike lane. What is this China?

Purchasing car insurance in Massachusetts can be an expensive proposition, but living in Worcester is sublime. Only a true Masshole can appreciate the bleak, bone-chilling landscape offered by a winter in Worcester. As long as there is a reliable supply of booze, winter in Worcester is a manageable affair.

Winter will test a soul in Worcester or Boston. And maybe that is the underlying reason for the insanity of Massachusetts drivers; they would rather die in a car wreck than go through another soul-crushing winter.