Night Fun with Camera, Snow and Lights

Winter has finally come to London, Ontario, and snow now blankets the city. This homeowner is still turning on his Christmas lights despite it being well into the new year.

Below is a silly picture shot quickly through the windshield of my car. It shows a van moving by a home with a few Christmas lights. The circles are camera movement. I'm not as steady as I once was.

Let's call this one art.

A cool corridor

It was Wellington Square. Then it expanded to become Galleria London. Now, it is the Citi Plaza. Where once there were rows of stores crowded tightly together, there is now the University of Western Ontario continuing studies program.

The corridor is one of two spans linking the two halves of the giant development. At one time there was a Koala Blue store in the other span and one could look down on King Street from the store's large window. Today only a few recall Koala Blue, the dream of Olivia Newton-John. And few remember Galleria London was the dream of Canadian developer Robert Campeau. Both dreams are now badly faded.

Nice corridor, though . . .

Outside is cold; Inside is warm.

Ah, the beauty of central heat. When it is cold outside, just touch the thermostat. You have to love it.

The second decade of the century is now almost through the fourth day. The storm that dumped 50 cm of snow on my home has wrapped it up but it left some really cold temperatures. The kids at the school where my wife works didn't go outside today - too cold.

A perfect day for doing a jigsaw puzzle with grandma.

Best to stay off roads deep with snow

I guess this young man didn't hear that authorities were recommending staying off snow clogged roads. A winter storm Saturday continued all night and off and on Sunday, leaving many roads, especially in the suburbs, clogged with snow. My backyard had 50 cm. of snow with the depth deeper in the drifts.

1st snow storm of year and 50 cm plus buries my London home

Possibly as much as 20 cm of snow fell on parts of London Saturday. (I just checked the depth of snow in my backyard: 50 cm as of Sunday morning. It is deeper on my compost bin but I'm not fighting drifts to reach it and take an accurate measurement.)

The storm is expected to continue off and on through Sunday depending upon the strength of the lake effect snow squalls.

Hwy 402 west of London was closed because of white outs Saturday afternoon, as was the Bluewater Highway south of Bayfield. Strong snow streamers coming from both Lake Huron and Georgian Bay brought snow squalls, and winds gusting from 50 to 60 km/h, to large swathes of Southwestern Ontario.

Even trees are bundled up against the cold, and the snow

Finally, a real  snowfall. New Year's Eve was relatively snow-free but the first day of the new decade was a different story. There was a lot of snow. It is now early in the morning of January 2 and the snow is still falling. I'll be getting some exercise shoveling the driveway come daybreak.

And the trees, if you are not from a country with heavy snowfalls, are wrapped in burlap to protect them from snow damage. A heavy fall of the winter white stuff can bend and even break tree limbs.

Champion graders still plowing London streets

London finally has some snow. And when snow comes, the snowplows can't be far behind. (Actually they can be far behind; There have been times that two, or even three days, have past before a plow opened our suburban street. Oh heck, I confess. There have been times that the city has left it to the sun and time to clear our street.)

I mention the make of grader because this plow was made in Goderich, just a little more than an hour north of London. Sadly, it must be reported that the plant, after more than a century of operation, has been closed and the work moved to the States. To read the whole story check out Rockin' On: the Blog.