Snowbound – the Day After

I’m back in the cozy confines of the 8-4-5.  We still have plenty of snow here, but there’s also a patch of grass to be found in the back yard, right near the shingles that blew off the shed.  The area of bare ground is a result of the drifting, blowing, and the sun as well, along with some temperatures that ventured beyond freezing.

Yet, back in Brooklyn, Queens, the Bronx, and Staten Island…things remain a mess.  A day later, there are two large regrets:

1) That I ever turned off of Ocean Parkway in the first place (I thought it would be OK, and simply didn’t know how bad it was ahead), and

2) That we never took pictures of the experience.  I had my camera with me!

Anyway, I read a stunning and largely scathing portrayal of Mayor Snowberg’s reaction to this situation in the New York Times, by Michael Powell.  Mr. Powell, it turns out, is from the Ditmas Park area as well, so he knows first hand exactly what it was like for Carrie, and the Adams’s of the suburbs.  The Ditmas Park Blog also linked to the story.  I found the comments to be most interesting and largely devoid of the idiocy that comments can normally have.

Friends who have lived in New York City for years (or those who used to live there) say that it’s always been like this.  Manhattan gets cleaned and the outer boroughs are told “fuhgeddaboudit.”  Others say they can’t ever remember it being this bad.  Some said last February’s storm worse than this one and that the City recovered much quicker.

I’m not compelled to debate with anyone about it.  The simple bottom line is that it’s bad.  The media is all over the mayor.  The people are up in arms.

And now, people are dying (New York Daily News).  A baby is dead before it ever had a chance, because emergency services couldn’t get to her mother.  Simply wow.

Yet Mayor Broadwayberg says New Yorkers should go to a show!  Hey!  Let’s see if more people get maimed or die during another performance of the Spiderman fiasco!  WAAHHOO!!

All along, the Sanitation Department is ready for the Times Square orgy!

Again.  WAHOO!

Side note: Said it before.  Say it again.  I want the old Crossroads of the World back.  I don’t want the manufactured New Year’s Eve.  I want a younger, healthier, understandable Dick Clark, perched outside (though no Guy Lombardo…holy crap I don’t like that freaking song).  I don’t want Seacrest, and apparently that’s the only night Carson Daly works anymore.  Clearly, I don’t want him either.  And I want Howard Johnson’s back in Times Square (clams and the daily double of two hot dogs!). 

Perhaps with some of this, I wouldn’t dislike it so much.  Ah, but I’ll be with Carrie (hopefully – if I can get to her), so it should be much better.  I’ve tried to have a better attitude about it.  Still, I don’t do the trappings of the night (the hats and so on).  I eat.  I drink.  I prefer to watch movies and laugh and not see Times Square.  But times change, and maybe, with two enjoyable NYE’s in a row (last year with Mick and Gretchen at Tom and Sharon’s), I can begin to not hold the dread for the night that I normally have.

OK, way off the beaten path.

Word is some of the subways are running again.  Plows are still doing their thing, and maybe they’re getting to some side streets.  Temps are supposed to rise.

We can only hope.