Blizzard today. The original projections were for us to get somewhere between 12"-18" of snow beginning last night at 9 PM. At 8:30 they announced that the system had shifted south of us, and now we were only supposed to get somewhere between 2"-5". However the wind would remain extremely strong, prompting them to close the airport due to the danger of planes being blown off the runway.
Woke up this morning to about 3" on the ground with snow still falling. Temp was a very reasonable 26F, but the wind was a constant 30 mph with gusts much, much higher than that. Outside of the airport, nothing else in town was closed. So my hopes of a "work from home" day were dashed.
I left the house about 1/2 hour early expecting a really tough ride to work. I was pleasantly surprised. I put the bike in a low gear and slowly spun my way to the office. Traffic was minimal due to me leaving the house so early, and what traffic was on the road was moving slow due to the snow. The main roads had been plowed at some point during the night, so they had less accumulation. The MUP wasn't yet plowed (expected) but being virgin powdery snow and me not trying to break speed records, I easily pedaled through the snow. Some areas had blown completely clear and other spots were quite drifted. I dressed about perfect with a t-shirt and a windbreaker and my long cycling pants. The wind was strong and I was heading straight into it, but my speeds were so low anyway that it didn't seem to bother me a whole lot. Visibility was the biggest problem (hence it being called a blizzard) with the wind picking up the snow and blowing it sideways.
It took about 50 minutes for me to ride the 4 miles to the client's location, but I took my time and really enjoyed the ride. I stopped and snapped some pictures. Unfortunately the wind kept blowing my bike off the kickstand, but really that was the only downside of the commute.
