Oh Yeah, It's HUMPDAY alright...

Well let's see...in the past 24 hours we've had sleet, freezing rain, snow, more sleet, and a touch more snow, and just a smidgen of freezing drizzle (and sleet).

Sure makes things appear like that winter wonderland of song. Looks like we got around 6 inches, and unless you shoveled last night to remove that layer of SLEET under the snow, you're going to really be "having fun" outside today. Snow is an excellent insulator (ask any Inuit tribesman), and unless you got the sleet off the concrete, it will freeze to the sidewalk or driveway with all the snow on top if it. It's just plain old Physics, folks!

FWCS has closed today (good call, considering the SIDE STREETS SUCK as far as traffic goes - at least they do on the SOUTH side of town). Sorry kids, this snow won't be making any good snowmen today.

Jay County was real smart and closed last evening before 7PM!

Talk about foresight (well, there's that, and the fact that they ARE more RURAL down here...a "southside" I can really get into, as in a LOT FEWER IDIOTS and a lot MORE NICE PEOPLE).

Since some of you might be snowbound today, take a few minutes to punch up the FWPD online scanner and listen in on what you're NOT getting yourselves into.

Here's the link:

http://www.aboiteindependent.com/content/radio_city.htm

It's amazing what you will hear regarding the state of our (local) society.

And you'll have a much better appreciation of the men & women in blue.

Now, let's take stock in my particular area, shall we?

Well, it looks like no one is getting their ass out of the sack to shovel the sidewalks (other than yours truly), as you can see from these freshly-taken snapshots up and down my block. And even though the kids are "off" today, you can bet THEY WON'T be around (down here), shovels on shoulders looking to make some REAL EASY cash by clearing sidewalks. Maybe in those NICE neighborhoods we'll still see those young entrepreneurs doing the right thing.

I did contact Captain Tom Bandor at NCE regarding citing people who DO NOT clear the sidewalks, and this is the body of the email he shot me back:

Bob

I do appreciate your perspective on this issue, the problem is staffing and prioritizing duties. We here at NCE cannotkeep up with the day to day higher priority duties.

By the way the ordinance does not name an enforcement authority. With that being said if there weren’t anything else to do and we could afford to employ all of the NCE Officers, the Police Officers and the Firefighters in this City for enforcement of this particular ordinance we could only touch a small portion of this vast City.

Therefore our enforcement efforts would appear to be arbitrary and capricious and cited violators would have standing in court. I believe that this is why in 24 years of Law Enforcement experience in this community I have never seen this enforced at any level.

Tom

And there you have it.

Through no fault of his own, Captain Tom has said that the city has an ordinance- city code 99.047 (of many I might add) that is relatively UNENFORCEABLE (much like the NOISE ordinance-city code 96.03, 96.05, & 96.15, and the IMPROPERLY ILLUMINATED VEHICLE ordinance -IC-9-19-6-4- on the southside of Fort Wayne).

So I guess all of us "oddballs" that feel the need to (out of courtesy and/or a sense of pride) clear our sidewalks can all roll over and get back to dreamland, eh?

And if anyone is even thinking of slipping on our sidewalks and then SUING us...think again, because NONE of us really HAVE to clear ANYTHING off for you to walk on (in spite of the fact that we WOULD be liable under conditions such as we have today).

Nah...we'll be out clearing OUR sidewalks anyway.

We're weird that way...aren't we?

WE still give a damn.