I've decided to wait until the weekend to assemble the cabled hat. That way I can devote time to the work when I'm refreshed.

While I'm waiting for the toe-up sock KAL to begin in the KP Lovers group on Ravelry and my second skein of Foxen sheep to arrive, I've started the Nomad Hat and scarf. This is my first knit with a bulky yarn in years and the work certainly goes fast. The pattern is really simple. Since February is usually the coldest month here, this hat will come in handy.

After last year's snowmaggedon, I think most figured things couldn't get any worse. Wrong! Yesterday afternoon, evening, into this morning turned into the commute from hell for a lot of people. There are thousands without power, unable to either reach the Pepco (the electric company), get the automatic message recording where you can report an outtage or get a human on the phone. On top of that in the post mortem of yesterday's commute, it turns out that the Feds made and disseminated the decision to close at 3:00 to all agencies and jurisdictions at 11AM. The directive was that people were suppose to leave two hours before their regular leaving time or by 3:00 and those who could leave and telework were suppose to do so. Well, when the head of OPM stated this on the radio this morning, Fed employees called in, one saying his agency didn't make the annoucement until 1:55--although everyone knew because it had been reported on the web. Others said managers were relunctant to let them go and expressed a relunctance to telework or that their bosses were relunctant to let them telework. Upshot is there's going to be an assessment of the directives, how they are communicated with the emphasis that employees and their managers are suppose to follow not interpret them.

The other interesting fact is that the people who control traffic at intersections during rush hour are pulled during weather events to plow the snow. So they weren't available to prevent intersection blockage and direct traffic flow.

I left the office at 2:58 and arrived home at 4:21 (had to stop to get cat food). In that almost 90 minutes it went from a heavy drizzle, to pouring rain, to pouring ice slush, which quickly accumulated on every surface and was the real traffic stopper because it made everything slippery, to snow falling like a tropical downpour. During the snow, there was constant lightening and thunder. The lightening was weird colours, but it kept Toupie entertained. By 11pm it was over but thousands were still trying or stuck trying to get home on roads that were parking lots or closed down.