Thursday, February 08, 2007

Frosty the Snow-Dumpling

The much-heralded snow arrived at lunchtime. In fact, it had been so heralded that the rail service starting delaying trains before it arrived -- now that's customer service! Just don't tell any of the incompentent private companies that make up British Rail; they'd love to do that.



Considerably heavier than the light shower we had earlier in the week, the snow started coming down thick and fast at about midday, about the time we'd planned to cycle over to WTC for lunch at Wagamama's, followed by an appointment in one of the buildings there. We held off on lunch, trying to convince ourselves with eternal British optimism that it was brightening up, but at 1.30 we had no choice but to head out into the snow. Ignoring the BBC's advice to take a spade (although a flask of hot tea would have been fantastic), we pedalled slowly over to WTC -- a journey that normally takes 10 minutes, but today took 25. This was, it must be said, also to do with the fact that the road we needed to turn onto was closed off by building works, so we had to do a huge loop around the complex -- no fun in driving snow and on slippery bike paths. However, we arrived safely, to be greeted somewhat incredulously. "You cycled in this weather!?!" Yep, foolhardy and proud of it.

After the meeting, PJ slyly slipped off to Schiphol in a taxi to wait out the inevitable delays on his flight to Copenhagen. I had to cycle the 10km back home, the snow now replaced with heavy, horizontal sleet, which stung my face and made it tricky to see where I was going. Please keep your fingers crossed that it doesn't freeze tonight; slush is bad, but ice is worse.

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