Life Inside an Iowa Ice Storm
posted by on March 1 at 11:41 AM
The phone rang in my bedroom yesterday - it definitely wasn’t anyone I expected to be calling me. “This is the Department of Homeland Security,” said the pre-recorded voice on the other end of the line, “If your home is still without power, seek shelter immediately.” Turns out my town has been declared a disaster area!
Coast-centric Seattlites may or may not be aware that an ice storm ripped through the Midwest last weekend. I’m originally from southern California. I couldn’t tell you the different between sleet and hail and had no idea what the hell “ice storm” meant. But here’s the deal: you wake up to a slate-grey sky and rain so cold it freezes when it hits the ground. After a few hours, every pine needle, picnic table and abandoned bicycle is encased in a layer of ice. Soon, the ice starts weighing down tree branches, which snap off dramatically and plunge downward, icicles and all.
Yes, yes, it’s a dangerous disaster area, but people (uh, young people) are too excited about the changed landscape to stay inside and hoard canned tuna and flashlight batteries. All week, people have been wandering the streets with cameras, scampering under the more threatening trees and snapping hundreds of photos. Here’s three of my favorite:
icicles on bicycles
frozen buds
blades of grass
More interesting than 43 degrees and drizzly, anyway.
hey sarah! good to see you back on slog. i was in Iowa a few weeks ago and i can confirm that i prefer 43 and rain to interesting ice storms. where do you go for entertainment? what kind of fun do you have there? can you walk to several different and interesting shopping areas? any good cafes? i know the answer to these questions already but thought i'd remind you why every single person under the age of 30 i talked to in Iowa couldn't wait to leave. Iowa is boring. The people who live in Iowa, however, are some of the nicest people i've ever met. hope to see you back in Seattle!
I'm actually warming to Des Moines. A lot of good bars and the like.
My favourite snow story on the news was the fireman talking, on camera, about downed powerlines when all of the sudden, a couple behind him explode into sparks and start a fire.
Besides, how bad can a city that's hosting the Drinking Liberally National Conference be?
The ice on the bikes is beautiful. They almost look like aliens or something on another planet.
I don't understand the Department of Homeland Security message at all. Doesn't your home count as shelter? Do they mean "seek shelter that has power"? If they're telling you to leave the house and go wander the icy city, looking for someplace with electricity, doesn't that seem more dangerous than staying put in your home?
so says you. 45 degrees and rain? winter in seattle. paradise.
The blades of grass look like a school of those little see-through fish, where all you can see to tell that they are there are their eyes and their intestines.
The Des Moines Art Center, icy or not, is wonderful. Arguments could easily be made about how it's much better than SAM.
Not only was school cancelled in the wake of a particularly nasty ice storm when I was a little kid, but we got right out there with our skates and played ice hockey on a neighborhood street.
Lovely to look at, but hell to walk on.
smirk
We (in Renton) had an ice storm like that about 4 years ago.
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