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There are other activities as well, I was just giving a couple of examples. For someone to equate shoveling snow to toughness and a reason for bragging when I equate it to common yard work I guess there is a big difference of opinion.
When 2 kids in Chicago or Michigan are arguing who's dad is tougher does it go something like this?
Kid 1: "Well by dad can shovel 60' feet of snow in 2 hours"
Kid 2: Oh yeah, well my dad can shovel 100' of snow in 1 hour and de-ice the sidewalk at the same time"
C'mon, we all know that real Northerners don't shovel snow. We buy snow blowers for the job. Then, the debate over who's dad is tougher comes down to who has the biggest, baddest snow blower.
WTF? I don't even know why someone would think that in the first place. What color did she think the lakes were? White?
I'm assuming she thought the Great Lakes were like large ponds or something.
Did you tell her the Great Lakes are about the same size as the states of New York, New Jersey, Massachusetts, Connecticut, Rhode Island and Maryland combined?
And hold around 6,056,144,308,500,000 gallons of water. About six thousand trillion gallons.
They're blue because they're deep glacial lakes of fresh water......
That is exactly what I told her.
As to what color she thought they were - brownish due to pollution.
The Principal and Superintendent were also there and they both took her side and said they also heard they were dyed. Went home and told my wife we were getting the Heck out of Crazytown and back to where the educators had a clue. Good to be back with the sane people and teachers. (Teacher, Principal, and Super were all related)
C'mon, we all know that real Northerners don't shovel snow. We buy snow blowers for the job. Then, the debate over who's dad is tougher comes down to who has the biggest, baddest snow blower.
As to what color she thought they were - brownish due to pollution.
The Principal and Superintendent were also there and they both took her side and said they also heard they were dyed. Went home and told my wife we were getting the Heck out of Crazytown and back to where the educators had a clue. Good to be back with the sane people and teachers. (Teacher, Principal, and Super were all related)
Nepotism can be a problem, no doubt..
I'm going to assume that this was rural, northern Maine ( Caribou, Presque Isle, etc), but perhaps not..
I may be guilty of bragging about it some, to the extent that I do enjoy highlighting our long plight against the elements. Part of that is because I grew up mostly in Southern California and have a lot of friends there who do complain when it gets into the 40s (why is beyond me, because that is a fairly typical and predictable temperature on winter evenings).
As for whether it really makes us tougher, I'd say that it does for a few reasons. In most Southern cities today, it is not only possible, but quite probable for people to mostly avoid the extreme heat with the brief moments of discomfort between air conditioned house, air conditioned car, and air conditioned mall. I make no value judgment, life would be very difficult there without air conditioning. But the fact is that a/c has given the Southern man a chance to avoid conflict with the elements. Contrast that with summer in Boston, where most people have just a few window units that we hardly ever use. Our summer may be cooler, but the way we experience it is probably not so different.
In the North, many of the cities are not built around cars and people walk quite a bit or wait outside for trains and buses. It means you are dealing with the weather in a more direct fashion. And while some people may get snow blowers (particularly in the suburbs), I see very few in my neighborhood because the sidewalks, front steps, car that must be dug out, etc. tend to not be so blower accessible. There are usually several occasions each year of multi-hour shoveling parties.
We get ten times the amount of snow as Chicago in NNY and a full wet shovel load can barely be lifted. The 300ft ditch digging analogy may be somewhat comparable if you consider doing that every day for four months (120 times a season) before you can do anything else. It has taken me up to eight hours after a bad storm to get out of the driveway and that was with having to winch out the plow and shoveling.
I have to admit we live in probably the worst snow band in the country outside of a couple of spots in the Rockies. You haven't seen snow till it's over the top of the telephone poles. That's why I now spend the winters in Fla. Too much work.
I have 3 trees need to come down right now which is about average for the year.
I also have a 60 ft pine that is down that I need to cut up.
My irrigation is ongoing as I expand the garden and other shrubs.
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