Snow Holiday!

In Chattanooga, we usually get one good snowstorm a year. And when we do, we stop to marvel.

A bluebird sunning himself on our window ledge.

We had a flock of bluebirds.

These sparrows had already built in nest in our gutter. When they got snowed in, they excavated a tunnel.
They have been popping in and out as they go about their birdly business.

No snowstorm would be complete without hot tubbing in the snow.
Afterwards, we had bowls of snow cream.

International Intrigue

Every morning, my clock radio goes off and classical music wakes me up—which is fine if it’s Debussy, but not so great if they’re playing Wellington’s Victory. (I think it reflects a perverse sense of humor to be playing something like that at 7am.) In any case, this morning the music dutifully began playing. Then, something else happened.

In the midst of the music and an NPR report, a series of beeps began. They had rhythm. There were breaks, which were followed by more beeps. My husband rolled over and said, “What’s that?”  I said, “Uh, I think it’s Morse Code.” Or some variation because it wasn’t exactly Morse Code.

So we began speculating which of our neighbors is actually a sleeper agent for the North Koreans. Could it be the young woman next door, who talks with a nervous wheeze? Maybe she’s nervous because she’s afraid we’ll discover her secret. On the other hand, a spy would probably have better training than that. It could be our other neighbor, the one who never does any weeding and her weeds migrate in our yard and flower beds when they go to seed. But I think spies learn not to draw attention to themselves—and weed problems are a definite attention getter, at least for me.

Of course, the cold reality of the situation finally cooled my writer’s imagination. We live in Chattanooga, not exactly a hot bed of international intrigue. The Morse Code was probably just some kid trying out his skills…at 7am…not likely.

Hmm. Maybe Chattanooga is the new hot bed of espionage—it’s our uberfast internet service (actually made the national news as fastest in the nation). And now Chattanooga is the home base for clandestine messages. It makes sense, and it explains the dozen Homeland Security officers that I saw at Starbucks.

Now I just have to figure out which of my neighbors is involved.

Laughing at the Rain

Many of you may remember the basement flooding fiascos. If you don’t remember, here’s a refresher. After heavy rains, we discovered that the city’s run-off waste water fountains up through a drain in our basement and floods it. What makes the flood even nastier is that it ruins the circuit board of the heater ($500). We called the insurance—they laughed. We called the city. An engineer came over. His schematic of the underground pipes does not contain diagrams of the pipes that our drain led to. But he assured us it was irrelevant because our drain was illegal. Uh huh. All the houses built in the 40s have this kind of drain if they have basements. Clearly, the city dealt with a problem by out-lawing it. Convenient for them. Not for us.

After a couple more episodes of flooding, plumbers were called. We were told to call the experts. “The experts” came. Since no one knew where the pipes were or how deep they ran, they couldn't put a backflow valve on the pipe. But they came up with a plan.

The specialty plumbers came with concrete and a thing that looked like a chainsaw on steroids. First, they poured concrete into the drain. HA! Take that City of Chattanooga. Now you can deal with your own water issues. Then the plumbing dudes revved up the concrete saw. I thought that with the door to the basement closed, we’d be golden. I was wrong. Within fifteen minutes, the house was enveloped in a concrete dust fog. And the smell of burning cement isn’t pleasant. In Matt’s words, “It’s stinks!” Matt and Jake ended up in the master bedroom with the HEPA filter cranked.

Despite everything, by dinner the basement was fixed. We are now the proud owners of a sump pit and an uber sump pump. I can now laugh at the storm clouds. I can shake my head and tsk at the water spouting out of the city lines. And I can say, “Neener” to the city engineer. Of course, he doesn’t care. He’ll just be telling some other home owner that their basement drain is illegal. You just gotta love the government.

MTE

The city of Chattanooga has come up with a new method of funding. It’s called Mobile Traffic Enforcement. Actually, I have no idea what the city calls it. MTE is my name for it. And I’m sure other people have names like #@#**!!

Here’s how it works. The city bought a special van equipped with four windows on one side. Each window has a camera for taking pictures of speeders’ license plates. The city then hides this van and photographs any and all speeders. Don’t get me wrong—I think speed limits are a good thing, especially in residential neighborhoods, etc. And yes, I do have “sour grapes” as the MTE has ticketed our van. But here’s the thing, the powers-that-be have hidden the MTE at the end of a sharply downward sloping tunnel. As if this weren’t bad enough, the tunnel is so poorly lit that you can’t read your speedometer. In fact, the tunnel is more dimly lit now than what it used to be. Conspiracy? Maybe.

Of course, the MTE isn’t always at the tunnel. Sometimes it’s downtown, concealed behind a tall building. Other times it’s hidden on a side street at the bottom of a hill near the old industrial area. You, skeptical reader, might be thinking that the MTE is reducing traffic accidents. You’d be wrong. I’ve had to warn our kids, “Watch out when you exit the Brainerd Tunnel, drivers are slamming their brakes at the end because they don’t know if the MTE is there.”

The other day, I was driving out of the Brainerd Tunnel in the left lane and another car was beside me in the right-hand lane. Both of us were driving exactly 35 mph. (A quick glance in my rear-view mirror told me the MTE was there). A BMW came up from behind and couldn’t get past us. Immediately, he began tailgating me. I looked into my rearview mirror and saw him gesticulating and becoming apoplectic. I just laughed and thought, “Dude, we’re saving you $50. Cope.” So, remember that the next time you’re driving behind someone driving exactly the speed limit—they’re probably saving you from a ticket.