January 12, 2024 — A Roller Coaster
Greetings!
Last week I mentioned that while I have a long list of things to do, I lack the [ will / time management skills / nap avoidant behaviours ] to work on them. In truth I was attempting to use that declaration as motivation; to trick myself into doing something — anything! — from the list.
And you know how sometimes things don’t go as planned?
Yeah.
Nope.
First there was a dog induced sleep deprivation incident on Friday night that wiped out Saturday. Then on Sunday I got a phone call:
Boss: “Hey Jeff, are you available to work on Monday?”
Me: “Sure.”
I know, I know. Dumb thing to do, but I did it anyway. So on Monday morning I went in to work. And Monday became Tuesday, which begat Wednesday, which sloshed over into Thursday.
This is in the Makerspace. Thankfully it’s not all that busy at the moment, but someone has to be there to help people, answer questions, or just generally look important when random administrative personnel wander past the door. So there I am, doing things like that, for four full days.
But obviously that can’t be all there is to the story, particularly given the opening image, right? It’s gotta be more complicated than simply working a few unexpected days, and you’d be correct to think that.
Monday was fine, though as it was my first day working full time in something like six months, I was exhausted by the time I got home. Tuesday was also good, and I wasn’t nearly as tired that evening. But on Wednesday things started to shift. For reasons that aren’t entirely clear, the commute home on Wednesday night took nearly two full hours by transit. That’s way too long, and I can’t adequately explain where the time went. I don’t think I was abducted by aliens, but if that happened they would have wiped my memory, right?
On Thursday afternoon a polar vortex arrived, and shortly before it hit a couple centimetres of snow fell. And just how well does Vancouver handle that much snow? Not well at all. Not even a little. Every road stopped. Completely dead. I rode the Skytrain up to Waterfront station as usual and then went looking for a bus home. They were all delayed and every road from there to North Vancouver was completely clogged with immobile vehicles. Google Maps was a sea of dark red lines. So I took a SeaBus across the harbour to get closer to home. Like the SkyTrain, that actually worked well, but it was also the end of my good luck.
Once on the North Shore, I waited a while for the next bus heading in the right direction. It showed up — packed completely full — but enough people got off to make it possible to fill it back up again with those of us waiting to go somewhere else. We got moving, and went about one block before stopping for a few minutes in the parking lot normally known as Marine Drive. Happily we only needed to go a few metres on that street before the driver could squeeze into a left turn lane and got us onto Lonsdale Avenue. We crawled three blocks up Lonsdale and then turned onto 3rd Street, where we arrived at the first stop on the route. A few people got off and a few got on. Then the driver pulled the bus back out into traffic, over the course of five full minutes.
Ten minutes later we’d gone another block and a half.
No, really. No exaggeration. In fifteen minutes we’d gone almost nowhere, and the traffic stretched off into the distance. Third Street was going nowhere.
People started getting off the bus.
Two police cars passed us in the opposing lane, lights flashing.
More people got off the bus.
I considered my options, checked the time, and decided to join them. At the current rate I wasn’t going to get home at any reasonable time, so it was better to abandon this silliness and do other things.
I walked back the way we’d come, where I found a dive burrito place for dinner, and then hiked a few blocks up the hill to the library, There I found sporadic internet and a power outlet. Some of this post was written at that time.
After 90 minutes, traffic was starting to ease and Anne decided to come get me. She got me home at about 8 pm.
Total commute time: 4.5 hours. The cause: a tiny amount of snow just before rush hour.
But the tale isn’t complete. I was supposed to work Friday as well. My boss told me that he could just close the Makerspace given the situation, but I said I’d try to go in. By then things would be back to normal, right? I mean, they’d have overnight to get everything back in working order. That’s plenty of time.
Ha!
The polar vortex dropped temperatures to -14º C (that’s about 7º F for my American readers) and Vancouver was still not dealing with it.
I saw the 6:30 am bus go by our home and thought the 6:53 bus would be no problem. Google Maps agreed with me on that point. And it turns out the 6:53 is a weird one that goes all the way downtown, rather than just to the local exchange. Getting downtown from the exchange any other way means (at least) one other bus and standing around in the cold, so I really wanted the direct one. As the time approached I bundled up to stay warm and went to the stop. And waited. And talked to another waiting passenger. And waited some more. No bus. Why it disappeared I will never know.
So I went home and sent email to my boss. At this point any transit that would get me to work would get me there late anyway, and I was not about to drive given the state of the roads (now covered in black ice) and the quality of Vancouver’s drivers (definitely not good). I told my boss that it wasn’t happening and suggested he close the Makerspace for the day as he’d originally offered. He agreed.
As of this writing I don’t know if I am working on Monday or not. The person I’m covering for seems to be pretty sick, and I won’t get an update on that until Sunday evening. With luck he’s back on Monday and my life returns to normal.
In other news, it seems I will try to write for the stone carving publication I mentioned last week. No time frame is set, and no particular subject matter is requested, so it’s all up to me. I’ll see how it goes.
And the rest of the to-do list remains unchanged from last week. Working for a living is hard! I can’t get anything done when I have to work full time.
And that’s all the news for the week. Please take care, keep warm, and stay off any icy roads!