The two big news items of the day: Snow and War. Both have been predicted to come in large quantities.

The rain had been falling in Boulder all evening. Weather reports predicted heavy snowfall. Heavier than we've seen in a long time. Some said a foot by tomorrow. Some said more. I was skeptical.

During my break at 22:00, it was still raining heavily. No snow yet, but the air felt cold enough for it.

Midnight. As I walked out of the store, the rain had indeed turned to snow, and it was falling heavily. It wasn't sticking to the ground yet, but that would change soon. There wasn't yet enough of it on Tobias's windows to warrant brushing it off.

Since my gas was running on empty, I stopped on the way out of Boulder to fill the tank, grudgingly paying the inflated prices brought on by the threat of war. $21.00 even, for just over 11 gallons. I can't remember the last time I paid over $20 for a tank full.

As I got on 36, the snow was starting to stick. Lots of it. And the roads were getting slippery. Insanely slippery. An evening's worth of rainfall, topped by a layer of snow, melding into an icy mush on the pavement.

As I started to climb the hill between Boulder and Louisville, traction became spotty enough that I started to wonder if I could make it to the top. As the ascent began, I passed a pickup who was going so slow that if I had stayed behind him, I didn't think I would have been able to maintain enough momentum to make it to the top.

Having left the pickup in the dust, I worked to keep as much speed as possible up the hill without going out of control.

40 mph....

30.....

20....

As I neared the top, any attempt to accelerate only spun the tires. Just make it over the hill...

15...

I had just enough momentum to carry me over.

From that point on, the remainder of my trip consisted of lots of sliding around, pumping breaks on corners, and generally just hoping I would make it before the snow got any deeper. (It must have snowed at least a couple inches just in the 30 minutes it took to drive home.) It's almost too much for poor little Tobias to handle.

On the way up Wadsworth[1] (there are two roads named "Wadsworth" in this town that run almost parallel to each other; all for the benefit of clarity to newcomers, of course), I saw another car that had literally slid from the opposite lane going the other direction, across the road, and barely missed a sign on my side, and landed in the ditch. When I stopped to investigate, the owner was already talking to another car that had stopped and was getting on the cell phone, so my help was not required. No injuries had been sustained.

Meanwhile, the snow continues to fall like a wild cheetah on crack.

If it continues like this, as some of the weather reports have predicted, I could find myself snowed in tomorrow. Since I requested time off later this week for the mysterious gathering, I am now scheduled to work the next two days, which could make for some interesting driving into Boulder. On the plus side, if everybody else gets snowed in, the store might not be very busy, which could make things nice.

Tonight, things were extremely busy for a while. According to people who were there earlier in the day than me, it was really busy all day. (Most Mondays are busy, but today even more so.) One might conclude that one or more of the following statements are true:

• Impending war makes people want to buy groceries.
• Impending snowstorms make people want to buy groceries.

On the subject of what looks to be the upcoming war... /me reads yanthor's latest content...

Unfortunately, due to my work schedule, I missed the entirity of President Bush's statement tonight. But I gathered a pretty decent summary from later reports. Nothing terribly surprising there. For whatever reasons there may be, he's going to send the troops in unless Saddam leaves the country in 48 hours.

What more can I say that hasn't already been said, and said better, by others? The leaders of our country are about to drag us into a conflict that is not only unjust, but downright insane. It's against international law. It's against UN rules. It's against the will of the people. It's against basic human decency.

To initiate an unprovoked invasion on another nation in the name of "protecting" ourselves is the battlecry of every warlord who conquers for conquest's sake. It is niavety to think that this case is somehow different or special because "We're the great, freedom-loving, infallable U S of A, so our laders would never do that."

Over the past few days and weeks, many people, myself included, have been asking and wondering, "Why?" Why is Bush so urgently obsessed with "disarming" Iraq that he can't be bothered to wait a few more weeks for the inspectors to complete their work before sending in an artillery that is certain to kill or maim at least as many civilians as were killed on Sept 11? (Assuming things go well. If not, the casualties could be much higher.)

There is no immenent threat from Iraq against the U.S. The only thing that makes it seem immenent (i.e. Orange alert, or whatever they're calling it now) is the suspicion that if we strike, someone else might strike back at us. The immediate cause for alarm originates not from the city of Baghdad, but Washington, D.C.

Though I know it may seem cliché to bring Nazi comparison into the debate, I'm going to do so anyway, since I've been continuing in my reading of Rise and Fall of the Third Reich lately. (It's a very long book.)

In late August of 1939, Hitler argued that it was urgent for Germany to take immediate action against Poland, due to the (fabricated) "atrocities" the Polish had been committing against those of German blood in their country. In speeches, he used the same words as we've been hearing a lot from our leaders lately, talking of how the Germans yearned for peace, and pleading (in the public eye) and demanding that the Polish to come to an agreement.

But behind the scenes, as documents that would later surface after the war proved, he was planning and plotting only one thing all along: Total invasion. In fact, he didn't even want to talk to the Polish diplomats, for fear that they would cave to his territorial demands, thus eliminating the justification for war. In the final days leading up to the war, he maneuvered left and right to avoid any real discussions with the Polish, all the while exclaiming about the "urgency" of the situation to warrant an immediate attack.

It has a familiar smell. Eerie, isn't it?

End rant for tonight.

Music: Tonight, I'm listening to Lagoona. High energy dance music to groove to.