Even Odds

You may have noticed that no one in this city can drive. I say that with equal parts understanding and burning rage. Its really not all our fault. We don't drive on the right side because a) there are very few streets that actually have a line down the center (so how can you tell if you're not on the right side?), b) there are parked cars on the right side and the left side of the street (which is really just the right side for someone else) so you bob and weave around them, and c) snow banks, snow banks everywhere... sometimes parked cars in disguise and sometimes they're actually moving cars driven by very lazy, dumb people who didn't brush off their cars or turn on their lights.

Turn on your lights.

Now a) is generally a budget thing out of our control but b) and c) are linked, rational phenomena. Let me tell you about a little thing we like to call odd-even parking. This is a scientific method by which one parks one's car on the odd numbered side of the street from 6pm on odd numbered days, and switches one's car to the even side of the street after 6pm on even numbered days.

Why all the hustle and bustle? 4 little letters: snow. In order to ensure that all our streets are thoroughly plowed post-snowfall, our snowfighters in the City Department of Public Works run the plows down one side of the street one day and the other side the next day. So when you don't follow odd-even parking and your cars aren't all parked on the same side of the street :ahem, students: then the street can't be cleared. And they ticket you. If you're ever woken from a sound sleep to a really loud continuous horn outside, that's your friendly neighborhood plow asking you to get outside and move yo' damn car. The plow is stuck and can't get down the street b/c the cars parked on both sides are blocking the way.

Let's also take a minute and consider- if the streets aren't plowed, I can't get out and get ice cream, I get grumpy, I shovel out the car, the sidewalk, and start on the driveway, I get bored, I mambo around the house, I clean everything in sight, I make a stew, I check my email obsessively, I get cabin fever, life becomes dangerous, and the ambulance can't get down your street to save you. So please, check the signs and park accordingly. Let's all enjoy the snow safely.

One last quaint detail: beware Fools Night. That's what the locals call it when Jan 31st turns into Feb 1st or an odd numbered month ends and a new month begins. Notice something? Oh yeah, two odd numbered days in a row! What is one to do? Follow the odd-even parking rules and don't move your car. In the immortal words of Jay & Silent Bob...:snoochyboochies: