But... but... but... the Roads Are Clear!

So... I click on Drudge.

From Drudge I click on the following: Federal Government in Washington to be Closed Monday.

Now... I'm in New York. I live about 50 minutes northwest of the GW Bridge.

This morning I had an airport run to do - Newburgh, NY to JFK. The roads were completely clear from my home in Harriman, NY, to Newburgh, and then from Newburgh all the way to JFK - which is in Queens, NY.

Roads clear; bridges clear - the trip from Orange County, NY into Rockland County, NY into Bergen County, NJ, over the GW Bridge into Manhattan, across the East River to the Deegan, down the Deegan to and over the Triborough (now officially the RFK Bridge), down the Grand Central, down the Van Wyck took us... umm... an hour and twenty five minutes maybe... and that was with me taking local NY Route 32 to local NY & NJ Routes 17 as opposed to taking the Palisades Parkway, a major highway.

(Which was clear too by the way - I took it on my way back from the airport because I was heading to a friend's to watch football rather than heading straight home.)

So... as I read our dedicated Washington DC civil servants preparing to enjoy a taxpayer paid snow day tomorrow... as I thought about how insubstantial the storm had amounted to here... I said to myself, "Self! It must be BAD in Washington DC... MUCH worse than here!"

So... I decided to google "live video washington dc" and HERE'S what I came up with:

The Washington D.C. 14th Street Bridge camera.

Black pavement. Lots of black pavement. Follow the links - there are twelve distinct Washington D.C. live traffic camera locations to pick from. All of them have one thing in common: Black Pavement.

Folks... in the great scheme of things giving a few tens of thousands of federal workers a paid snow day isn't going to be the straw that breaks the back of our nation's economy. But isn't it typical of government... snow days when the snow is gone from the roads?

To those of you who will be WORKING for your pay tomorrow - Monday, Dec. 21, 2009 - think happy thoughts.