Life imitating children's stories

Ireland has run out of salt.

I read a story when I was a child, oddly part of a compilation of Christmas tales, called I Love You More Than Salt. The premise (as I vaguely remember it) was that a widower king (aren't they always wifeless?) asks his three daughters to prove their love by telling him what they could do without if it meant still having him around.*

The first daughter said something along the lines of, "I love you more than silver." Acceptable.

The second followed with, "I love you more than gold." Awesome. King Dad loves this.

Then, daughter number three--the quiet, reflective one--answers, "I love you more than salt."

The King is not pleased. Salt?! When she could have said rubies or diamonds?!

Anyhow, some kind of banishment occurs, blah blah blah, magic spell, kingdom is deprived of salt, everyone is like, "Oh, our already bland medieval food is now even blander!" The King admits his fault and the daughter (along with the salt) is returned.

Moral of the story? Salt is good^†.

Over in these parts, we're not suffering from that kind of a shortage. Oh no. Our food is as salted (albeit potato-y) as ever; it's the weather that's caused the problem.

Growing up in the Pacific Northwest, I witnessed the routine shutting down of every functioning system and person in town due to inclement weather. The first sighting of a snowflake; the threatened accumulation of up to 1/4 of an inch of snow; the dreaded overnight freeze: any of these things would have schools closing early, opening late or not at all, people holed up in their houses for fear of driving or walking, and newscasters spouting hyperbole about "Arctic Blasts." Of course, in recent years, with climate changes becoming more and more evident, my little hometown has experience some severe winter madness-- and they still don't know how to deal with it.

Ireland is in the same boat.

A small country used to rain, overcast skies, and-- um, rain, Ireland was ill-prepared for the snow and ice that has hit the ground in medium force (maybe 2 to 3 inches) in the last week. In fact, the recent "chill" affecting the region is so unprecedented that the entire country's road grit and salt supply has been exhausted. I kid you not. Apparently, hardware and grocery stores have also come up dry as people have been trying to tackle the problem individually, and that supply is soon to run out.

So, what does this mean for Ireland? And more importantly, what does it mean for me, the average pedestrian? It means that only the main (and I do mean main) roads are free of ice, and only the sidewalks in town centres have been salted. When we had a rental car last week, the GD nearly spun out trying to get up the road to our apartment.

It means that I fell hard on the sidewalk while I was walking into town today, and then nearly fell again in the road while crossing the street. Luckily I'm not aged or frail, because if I was, I'd probably have shattered my knee and be in hospital now, causing crazy work overloads in orthopedics, where the GD is employed at the moment.

So, yes, this weather is unprecedented, Ireland (and World), but guess what? It's not getting any better from here. So take a page from Minnesota's book and invest in some snowplows, and please, for the love of god, bring back the salt!

*The premise sounds really selfish on the king's part, and I'm pretty sure it was, but I think there was also some further point to all of this which I am now forgetting.

^†In moderation.

Back in the Yu Ess uv Ey

I'm over the initial culture shock and back into the routine of living (temporarily) with my parents, and suddenly instead of feeling like I've been back for three weeks (which I have), I feel as though I never left. Frightening.

In May I was in London, Paris, Càdiz, Granada, Madrid, Paris, Edinburgh, Dublin, Prague, Krakow, Budapest, Vienna and Paris. Yeah, I know I said Paris three times. That's how many times I was there. And, okay, I was only in Dublin for 12 hours (would have been shorter if the GD and I hadn't missed our original flight to Budapest), but it still counts. My job ended April 30th, and I was on a train out of Flers the morning of the 1st. Never looking back.

Early on, I think I was pretty good about blogging. That is, I vaguely remember writing stuff about being in London with my sister. Then, as my internet access got spottier and spottier and my schedule involved fewer nights in each city, I found myself becoming lazier and lazier about keeping my (huge) reading public up to date on my travels. Then I got back to the states and was jet-lagged and mostly just felt like sleeping (or not, depending on which was less convenient) and that got in the way of blogging. Then I just hadn't blogged in so long that I felt overwhelmed by the idea of starting up again. And that's where I am now.

I saw more places in a month than I thought I would see at all in Europe, got to feel inadequate in numerous languages, bickered and made up with my mom at least 17 times, and enjoyed a well-mediated birthday dinner in Edinburgh. That is to say, the GD met my mom and managed to cut the tangible tension (after two weeks of mother-daughter travel) with pleasant, engaging conversation. I made it to (surprise, birthday destination) Budapest despite missing the aforementioned "plan A" flight by the second of three overnight trains the GD and I took in our travels.

And now I'm here, wondering if any of that just happened. I'm pretty sure it did. I've got pictures.

Global Warming, anyone?

So, first I get emails from all of my friends and family around Christmas reporting ARCTIC BLAST 2008, the cold front that hit the Pacific Northwest in December. Keep in mind, when I was a kid (and I'm pretty sure this still holds true), a quarter of an inch of snow could seriously shut down every school district in Vancouver, WA. This is a photo (courtesy of my mom) of her front yard/the street in front of the house.


They got 18.9 inches of snowfall! And then it snowed again in late January. I can't tell you how unheard of this is.

And things are no less bizarre over here. Ten people have died in Spain and France due to extraordinarily high winds, there has been serious flooding all over the south of France, London was shut down on Monday by a cold snap, and it's snowing in Flers. Just look.

Normandie: France:: PNW: USA*

This is extremely unprecedented. Are there really still people out there who don't believe we are in the midst of some serious climate change?

I'm supposed to be taking the Eurostar train to London on Saturday. All of this morning's trains from Paris to London have been canceled. Did I mention that London was totally paralyzed by snow? Like, shut-down-all-the-airports-and-stop-running-trains paralyzed? This had better all be cleared up in the next few days. I'm not spending my vacation in Flers.

*Remember analogies and how many you had to memorize for the SAT? Okay, probably for the GRE, too, I wouldn't know.