Every winter there are a couple of snowfalls in Red Bank, NJ. Often it is a few inches, sometimes it is a foot and every few years we have a heavy snowfall.
The day after Christmas it started snowing and the next day Red Bank had received 29 inches of snow.
It being the day after Christmas and a Sunday there was a very unorganized response to the snowfall by the snow removal contractors and city workers. On Tuesday our parking lot was still submerged in snow and we were told by our landlord that the snow removal contractor’s snowplows had burned out their transmissions on other jobs. On Wednesday, our parking lot and sidewalk had not yet been cleared and it became apparent that if we wanted to return to work we had to clear the snow ourselves.
Rik, Chris Law (the newest addition to our engineering staff) and Alan started with shovels, and in the late morning David joined us with his snow blower. The snow blower put in a valiant effort but was not made to deal with drifts up to four feet and the removal become a combined effort of digging and snow blowing also aided by Rich and Tim and our downstairs neighbor.
We are sure some of our friends will not be impressed with 29 inches of snow, and many of us have seen more snow. As a matter of fact, Chris Law, besides being a naval architect/marine engineer, also has a water resource management degree (and what is snow removal, but solid water management?) and spent a number of years as a snowboard instructor in Tahoe and, as such, really knows snow. He provided the opinion that the snow we had to clear was much tougher to shovel than the snow he encountered in California.
Well, duh! Of course it is tougher; it is New Jersey snow! You gotta problem with that?