Weather...Fuck it.

[PHEDG]

To clarify, I didn't create the picture. Although I did adjust the lighting to make it appear more realistic. Perhaps I will make my own.

[PHEDG]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_7E3XQuFE8Y

[PHEDG]

ok this is an original

[Ed Hocken]

Great work, Fej.

[PHEDG]

thank you, sir

[Ed Hocken]

I got to say Fej, if you ever have the time. Why not take those photo manipulation skills over to Cracked's site. They always run photoshop contests.

It's only $50 a win, but it's something.

[PHEDG]

whoa I must check that out

[Ed Hocken]

Go over to their message boards and you'll see a thread for photoshop contests.

I'd link it but I'm at work.

[Lisa]

Here I sit at work, my first venture out of my apartment since the day after Christmas.

The dept. of Sanitation finally got off their asses and plowed Queens, so my commute wasn't awful. While I was getting ready for work, I had NY1 on, as I always do, and they were reporting on some folks who had it far worse than me. Apparently, they really let Queens, Brooklyn and parts of Staten Island just sit - in those photos I posted, some of the snow plows were abandoned, so I don't know if the plow drivers just got overwhelmed or what.

But they told two news stories today about a 75 year old woman in Queens who died, possibly of a heart attack, because the ambulance couldn't get to her. Her daughter called 911, and it took 90 minutes for her to get someone to answer. Then the ambulance took another hour and 45 minutes to arrive, which by the time they got there, the lady was dead. A neighbor had been giving her CPR, and said she had a pulse long after the ambulance could have gotten there had the streets been plowed.

Another woman in Brooklyn went into labor around 8:30 AM, called 911 right then and there, and the ambulance didn't arrive till 6:00 PM. In the meantime, she was forced to try and deliver the baby herself, ran into complications, and the baby died - hours before the ambulance arrived, of course. There was a chance they could have gotten to her and revived the baby if - say it with me now! - the streets had been plowed.

The problem is that, as much as I love NYC, they're half-assed about stuff like this. We get a snow dump, and the Dept. of Sanitation doesn't know what the fuck to do with themselves. This isn't even a lot of snow for a NY blizzard. Queens got the most, which was 16 inches. We had way more than this in '96 and '06, but they did a better job of plowing in those instances, so there weren't things like abandoned snowplows and abandoned city buses on the sides of the streets. They just really have their heads up their asses in the case of this one.

[I_Cassini]

Incredible Lisa! I imagine in the days to come some heads will roll over those deaths. That must have been horrible for the mom trying to deliver and for the poor people trying to resuscitate that lady- thinking well the ambulance will probably be here in 5 more min.

[Lisa]

Oh, honey, there are going to be lawsuits out the wazoo over this one.

On a lighter note - it's 9:30 AM, and I think there are three of us here so far.

EDIT: Correction. Four of us.

[Timothy225]

Geez, Lisa. I'd heard on the news the rumor of something akin to an alleged strike in Brooklyn 'mongst the sanitation workers during the blizzard, just to turn up the heat in negotiations. This was when I was driving home from work yesterday, still amazed that sections of NJ weren't plowed out yet either. Hell, they barely salted the roads to help break up the ice.

NJ's no better than NYC lately when it comes to plowing. Turns out both the governor and the assistant governor took their vacations at the same time, prior to the blizzard. One of our senators had to step up and get shit done, and he was livid. Nobody was in charge that should've been during all this, thus plows were delayed, cars were stuck and/or abandoned, etc. Wasn't always like this, though. Back in the day, trucks were salting roads prior to the storm, and never left until the storm abated, even during a state of emergency.

[Ed Hocken]

I heard about that Tim, the fact they created the Lt. Gov's office for situations like this and both of them go on vacation.

There hasn't been this style of NJ-Hijinx since that whole McGreevy thing back in '04.

[Lisa]

Tim, yeah - NJ is the only place worse than NYC with regard to clearing the roads. Not sure if you guys recall over at DERP, but last year right before Christmas, when my Dad was in a car accident on an icy road (thank god he wasn't hurt) - yup, NJ.

[Matt]

I have to say this about MN: when snow comes, our crews are out doing their jobs as soon as they can. They pre-treat the roads and plow 24/7 if necessary to get the job done. Snow Emergencies are declared at appropriate times and people are fricking towed RIGHT AWAY to ensure that the roads can be plowed in a timely manner. In short: shit gets DONE.