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Rare, Collectible, & Otherwise

Category: Uncategorized (Page 20 of 45)

All’s Swell.

February 7, 2011 /

Intact. No collapsed roof. No snowdrifts (at least inside the store…). One of the basic rules of physics states that books and water don’t mix, so I worry about those ice-related roof leaks dripping water onto a Charles Dickens first edition.

Charles survived, just fine.

And just when you think you have it mastered: I got stuck right in front of the house this morning, where the ruts in the slush were so deep and hardened that the tires just bounced off. Couldn’t turn out of the rut. It was a ‘dig out with a shovel job,’ and the snow was so hard it had to be hacked away.

I’ve just about recovered from last week’s shoveling exercise, and it reassures me once again why I prefer life in Oklahoma. Snow? Every once in awhile – and if you live long enough, you may encounter more than enough at a single event. Those of you who are younger are now ‘pre-disastered,’ and can likely go the rest of your lives without running into another Oklahoma snowstorm like this one.

Little consolation considering more is predicted for Wednesday…

The bookstore is open today, though. Come get’em while they’re hot!

The Last Big Freeze.

February 6, 2011 /

No Television. No internet. No Facebook (maybe a good thing). No digging out the car for a run to QuikTrip.

Just imagining, here.

It was an off-hand comment from Channel 6’s down-to-earth news anchor Tera Vreeland, who – after it was noted the last big monthly snowfall record was established back in the 1930’s – quipped “Imagine what it would be like to be snowed in back then!”

I thought about it. The only communication 80 years ago was face-to-face (and I don’t mean Skype) or by telephone, that box on the wall that was cranked up with a handle to alert the operator, who would connect you with “your party.” After you made your calls – or the switchboard got overloaded – you could sit back with the radio and knit, or bundle up to step out and chop firewood.

If you didn’t have a pantry laid in with back-up snacks (I’m not sure snacks had been invented back then. I believe there were only hearty soups and vegetables), you’d just have to go hungry until the woman of the house whipped up something out of nothing. That’s the way it was, back then. The men keeping the fireplace stoked. The women stayed in the kitchen.

After a week, would there still be conversation? And during that era, trying to recover from the Great Depression, the Okies were either tramping to California to escape the Dust Bowl, or trying to plow it. Maybe the big snow was a welcome change.

This morning, the welcome change is the sight of a graded road, complete with visible pavement. It isn’t likely that I could have gotten out, back in the 1930’s, but probably would not have had a reason to do so.

For all the discomfort and inconvenience of the 2011 Blizzard, I’m thinking we haven’t really had it so bad – compared to what our counterparts went through, way back when. Sure, we’ve had some incidents and – unfortunately, a couple of tragedies. Still, even those who got stuck could reach in the pocket and make a call. The social isolationism of the 30’s is long gone. The Skype’s the limit.

I’ll meet ya at QuikTrip for a Double-Frappe-Half-Caf-Latte just as soon as I get the blogs updated, the Facebook status changed, and the GPS fired up!

Shake, Rattle, and Roll on.

February 4, 2011 /

I made it back. More than an hour later, I am still bumping up and down after traveling the Tulsa streets. If you haven’t been out, here is a recap:

The soft, fluffy snow is gone. In its place is something like linoleum or kitchen tile – hard as a bathtub and slippery as the soapy shower. Getting out of the neighborhood is a smooth slide until the intersection at the arterial street, where snow plows have constructed a foot high barrier reef. Expecting something better along Memorial? Think again.

It appears that some jokester buried enough bricks under the snow to simulate cobblestones, with pre-configured potholes. I have not driven such a rough road since I was searching for a downed airplane in the rugged Jack Fork mountains in southeastern Oklahoma. I broke the oil pan on the Monte Carlo in that adventure.

This morning, I traversed streets from Yale to Garnett, from 51st to 31st. That seven mile excursion took about an hour and fifteen minutes, round-trip. The car was being jacked around so badly I was afraid the suspension might just snap off, even at my slow pace. Naturally, I was tailgated by some Jeep-pickup-SUV-types who, no doubt, thought my speed was a ridiculous affront to their need for wheel-churning action, but lacked the appropriate anatomy to pass.

The ultimate irony was encountering several snow plows driving the arteries – with the blade UP! Here’s a suggestion: lower that thing and the results will increase dramatically. Sure, they’re enroute to their assigned plow-zone, but what would it hurt to scrape down some of the jagged ice-balls that cover every street in Tulsa?

A week’s business has been lost at the Bookstore, but that’s not my biggest worry. I keep thinking about the poor souls that intended to stop by before the blizzard, but stocked up on bread and milk instead, and are now on the warm side of the 2011 Blizzard, reduced to reading the back of the milk carton and the ingredients on the bread bag.

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