On Falling Snow + Drinking Wine

wine bottleWith virtually no snow up until now, all of us in the Boston area were just waiting for the other snow shoe to drop. And drop it did. I wonder if people will stop talking about the Blizzard of ’78 after this?

The Blizzard of 2015 will go down in the history books.  And we’re supposed to be getting two more instances of snow in the next few days. *sigh*

My street is still not plowed down to the pavement and snow banks are so high that it’s hard to see around them. It’s the worst part of the winter. When you have to hope for the best as you cross the street while walking or making a turn while driving.

Luckily, there is a certain coziness during winter storms. As long as the power stays on and the fridge is fully stocked. Yesterday I did some cooking and baking.

Also, G and I had some wine. I bought it months ago, but we never drank it. The storm seemed like a good excuse and we drank it while watching Netflix. It was our first time trying Liebfraumilch, which is a blended German wine that apparently is hated by many serious wine drinkers.

I am no wine snob; there are many wines that I like. I usually will choose a sweet cocktail over wine though. So you can judge my recommendation of this wine based on that. But I liked it. Not too sweet, but sweet enough. It felt smooth. We both found it enjoyable. And the price was right.

According to a tweet by Only in Boston, each household in this area would be opening between 12 -15 bottles of wine during the storm. I guess we drink way less than our neighbors. But that’s okay.

I’m curious. What were you eating and drinking during the storm?

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Photo Credit: Schmitt Söhne Liebfraumilch

A Tree Fell on My House

tree fell on my house

Well, this is not a post I ever planned on writing.  Soooo, last night a friend invited me to see King Lear. By the way, Joseph Marcell who played Geoffrey the butler in “The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air” played King Lear. He was all in!

The weather was really bad last night. Serious wind and rain with the Nor’easter that has been hanging over the region. I was tempted to cancel, because I hate going out in storms when it’s really not necessary. Also, I’m in the middle of a big writing project and had to stop writing in order to go out. Hopefully I can get my writing groove back today.

As we were leaving the play, we were talking about how Shakespeare was so dramatic and over the top. I’m no Shakespeare scholar, but I was thinking that if he wrote for TV, his shows would be slapstick comedy with mayhem and murder mixed in.

Speaking of mayhem, that reminds me of those Mayhem Allstate commercials. Especially, because there is a tree on my house and part of my car. Well, really my landlord’s house.

Anyway, I think Shakespeare was dramatic and over the top, because life really is dramatic and over the top. The drive home was really bad and I was wishing that I had stayed in. On the expressway, huge waves of water were splashing up everywhere. When it’s like that, I drive slowly, so everyone was speeding around me.

When I exited in Quincy, there were lots of leaves and huge branches on the streets. Some of the street lights were out too. When I got home, I had to drive over two more huge branches to park. When I got out of my car, I stopped to look at the branches, but it was so windy and rainy that I decided that I had better just get inside quickly.

When I got in the door and was walking up the stairs, I heard a huge noise. G opened the apartment door and said, “Did you hear that?” I had heard something. It sounded like a really big branch fell on the roof.

It wasn’t until about twenty minutes later that G looked out the front window and saw branches covering all the front windows. That noise wasn’t a branch. It was the whole tree! When I was walking in the front door, the tree had fallen just seconds after. It was a good thing that I didn’t linger!

As you can see from the picture that I took earlier, some branches are on my car, but they don’t appear to have done any damage. The front door is totally blocked, so I went out the back way to take some pictures this morning. Hopefully the tree will be removed soon, but apparently the city is dealing with a lot of similar calls. I hope this is not a sign of the winter to come.