We are in the midst of our first significant snow storm of the season. It started yesterday with all the sleet and ice, this afternoon it converted itself to lake effect snow and 35 MPH gusts of winds. School was canceled until 10 a.m. this morning. Unfortunately, my first class wasn’t until 11, but there I was doing the “snow day” dance I did as a teenager, hoping Mother Nature would let me spend the day home.
No such luck.
Instead I got to complete part I one my Surveying lab final exam. I don’t know if you’ve noticed or not, but surveyors tend to do their surveying outside. We were reminded by our professor that surveying doesn’t stop for the Mother Nature, or at least surveying exams don’t stop for Mother Nature, so there we were, bundled up in three layers of clothes, a heavy jacket, gloves and a dorky hat trying to determine the angle between the iced over cement pad in front of a doorway and the nut of a fire hydrant. Thank the universe it was cold so no dogs tried to relieve themselves as I stood shivering by the fire hydrant making like a target for my classmate behind the surveying gun. I had to dance around a few times so the person doing the measurements could make out my outline in the blowing and drifting snow.
I didn’t ace the exam but I think I did o.k. I think one of the icicles in my beard knocked the equipment when I was futzing around because I was off by 10 seconds. No biggie.
Next week it’s part II – equipment setup time trials.
