Wake-up Call

I've gotten into the habit of waking up, violently smacking the alarm clock into submission, and stumbling to the window to see if Thunder Bay has been beset by snow yet. I don't even put on my glasses, I just wrench open the blinds and if my eyes detect colour, then I can close the blinds and make my way to the shower satisfied.

This habit got me into trouble a couple days ago. Friday morning I wake up to an intruding sound:

*beep* *beep* *beep* *beep* *beep* *beep*

(I would have to keep that up for another twenty minutes for it to be accurate on the annoyance-scale.)

I look to the clock and shove my head under the pillow, mentally grumbling about having 40 more minutes to sleep and asking myself how long it takes for a truck to back up anyway. 1o minutes later, ready to pull my hair out at the annoying sound, I jump out of bed at the thought that the noise could be a bloody SNOWPLOW and as usual, wrench open the blinds. This morning I don't stumble to the shower satisfied. THIS morning, I open the blinds to find a guy a foot from my face, cleaning out the gutter of my house, in one of these:
















I swear to god I have never ran to the bathroom so fast in my life. All I remember is this plaid-clad guy laughing his ass off at the look on my face.


And there was snow on the ground, to boot.