The Early Bird Special at the Corner Room

Shown in this picture is the Early Bird Special at the Corner Room, a restaurant at the corner of College and Allen Streets, in downtown State College, PA. This breakfast includes two large eggs served however you please, home fries or a hash brown, buttered toast, and jelly. It is available for a mere $2.95 (plus tax and tip, of course) before 11 am on weekdays. After 11 am, and on weekends, it goes all the way up to $3.50.  ;-)  I don't know of a better, faster, cheaper breakfast in State College. This breakfast has featured prominently in a few of my past Blips, most notably this one from early February, and I am delighted to finally show you how lovely it is.
 
I promised in yesterday’s Blip that I would tell you the story of our most recent winter storm. And so I shall. The tale begins on Tuesday and ends on Wednesday, and I shall tell it from where it began until where it ended, as all stories should be told. The full (long) version appears below.

The short version (for those who don't have time to read the longer version) is this: we got yet another winter weather event that gave us snow and sleet on Tuesday, and icy precipitation Tuesday into Wednesday. Local conditions were atrocious. Penn State, where I work, is famous for almost NEVER closing. However, they delayed and then cancelled classes for the entire day on Wednesday.

I did not receive the notices before reporting to work as usual, by bus, and became stranded in town until a later bus could take me home. During the time I was stuck in town, I walked around and took some pictures, had a fine breakfast at the Corner Room, then caught my bus home and helped my husband shovel all of the ice out of our drive way.
 
And now begins the longer version. . . . First, let me tell you that this has been a winter for the record books. We broke records for the coldest weather in recorded history in our area for the month of February. We have had snow – and sometimes mixtures of all kinds of wintry precipitation – several times per week for much of the past few months. There are snow and ice piles everywhere. Travel can become treacherous at the drop of a hat. I usually drive to work. However, when the roads aren’t great, I take the bus. I have taken the bus to and from work a LOT this winter. It’s a great option to have.
 
As I mentioned in Tuesday’s Blip, a major winter storm was expected for the northeastern U.S. on Tuesday into Wednesday, and it was predicted to bring a mix of snow, sleet, freezing rain, ice, and rain, to be followed by rapidly dropping temperatures, during which whatever was left on the ground would freeze solid. And so Tuesday morning, my husband dropped me off at work, ran some quick errands, and arrived home just as the first fat flakes started to fall.
 
It snowed from about 10 to 3 or so, and then the sleet began. It was probably the heaviest sleet I have ever seen in my life. The sleet continued for several hours, and so that is what it was doing outside when I caught my bus back over to campus at the afternoon’s end; from there, I would catch my bus for home.
 
When I got off my bus on campus, it was sleeting sideways. The roads, sidewalks, and parking lots were slick as could be. Students were everywhere. The bus depot behind the Libraries, where I wait to catch my connecting bus, was teeming. On most days, about 25 people are huddling under the small roof of the bus depot; on a crowded day, maybe 50.  There is bench seating to fit about 12 people comfortably.
 
On this day, I swear, there were several HUNDRED people trying to fit under the bus depot roof to escape the sleet. I felt like an anchovy stuffed in a tin. And then, when a bus would arrive, the crowd would surge forward as one organism to look, and people would start leaping toward their bus. Then we anchovies turned into salmon, leaping upstream. It seemed as though every single person on campus had decided at one time: “The weather sucks! That’s IT! I’m going home!”
 
Conditions were wretched. An ambulance went by with lights flashing. Cars and buses were slipping, sliding. People were slipping, sliding. Every single bus was late. A boy standing behind me was eating French fries out of a Burger King bag. I submit to you, friends, that there may be nothing that smells better during bad weather than French fries; I could have mugged him for them. Yes, that’s how I feel about French fries: how I envied that boy. But I digress. My own bus, supposed to arrive around 4:20, was 10 minutes late. I got on with great relief, commented to the driver about the insanity of the bus depot. “Oh,” he said, “I think Penn State dismissed early.” And indeed they had. But I had not seen that e-mail before leaving work for the day.
 
Classes had been cancelled as of about 3:30 in the afternoon, with staff and faculty approved to leave by 4:30. Well, that explained a few things! I made it safely home. By the time I got there, my bus was 20 minutes late. The roads were awful. I got home to find my husband sitting on the front porch looking worried. We were both very glad to have me home.
 
The sleet continued for several hours, then turned into ice, followed by freezing rain. There was then supposed to be rain on top of that, before temperatures would begin to rise during the night. I couldn’t imagine how the roads would be much better in the morning, so I made plans to ride the bus the next day. Again.
 
Wednesday morning, I got up around 6 and checked the conditions. They were wretched. Everything that had fallen the day before had frozen overnight, and there was standing water on top of that. Walking down the drive way was a dangerous exercise, but I knew that, walking carefully, minding each step, I could do it. I checked the online listing of local school delays twice, once at 6 am and once at 6:30. Of course Penn State University Park had not cancelled or delayed; they never do! But Penn State DuBois was cancelled for the day and Penn State Altoona was already on a two-hour delay. Figures!
 
Winter conditions can be challenging for houses, too. A few weeks ago, my husband and I got up into our attic at home to check on the status of things, especially given the rough weather we have been having. And we discovered a couple of boards on the one side of the roof that were mildewed and damp. We conjectured that the dampness was from the damp air coming up from the upstairs bathroom vent. So we closed off that vent and decided to examine it again later. With rain on the way for this day, we were afraid that our roof might begin to leak. So before I did anything else on this morning, I cleared all of my backpacking gear and other junk out of the front closet (perhaps you have a closet yourself, and so you have some idea of the volume of junk am talking about) so that my husband could put the ladder in there to climb up into the attic. The cat, of course, thinks these kinds of games are marvelous fun, as you can imagine!
 
And then I turned my computer off around 6:35, stashed it in my daysack, and got dressed to catch my bus. I try to leave my house between 6:45 and 6:50 on days when I catch the 7 am bus. And so, of course, I missed the e-mail that came out at 6:45 am on this day, stating that Penn State was on a two-hour delay. Nobody but essential employees (those who clear the roads, feed the students, etc.) was expected to report before 10 am. But I did not know this at the time.
 
I caught my bus to campus, and got off one stop before I usually do. I thought I might have 15 minutes to take a few pictures. But as soon as I stepped off the bus, I knew I had made a really BIG mistake. The sidewalks were an absolute sheet of ice! And as I took one step, I started sliding backwards down the hill!
 
I looked down the path ahead of me, and realized there was No Way I was going to make it down the hill to the Libraries except sliding on my tush. So I took a different, slightly less steep, path. I walked over around the Inn and the Lion Shrine and snapped a few pictures of the lion covered in ice (that might have looked a bit like this). And then I made it to the bus depot to wait for my next bus. In places where they had begun to clear the sidewalks, you could walk. In places where they had not, you could not walk. My posterior and thighs were already complaining about the effort it took simply to hold my legs together and remain upright.
 
Out where we live, all of the roads were awful. But the main roads in town, surprisingly, weren’t so bad. The temperatures continued to rise, and what was frozen rapidly turned to slush. So at this point, the roads in town were merely a sloppy mess. The sidewalks and parking lots, however, were deadly death traps.
 
And the funniest thing happened. I had gotten off the bus that brought me in to work and walked a loop down around the Lion Shrine. My bus had dropped me off and made a loop around downtown. We caught up to each other again at the bus depot behind the Libraries. And I had the surreal experience of being there to see my own bus come by, but without me on it! (Think of that scene in the film Blue Velvet, where the fire truck goes by. Yes, like that.) I had a crazy thought – GET ON THAT BUS AND GO HOME! But of course, I didn’t. Maybe I should have . . .
 
I arrived at work a few minutes after 8, to find the place totally deserted. Except for the cleaning ladies, I was the only one there.  I became increasingly concerned. Had something awful happened? It looked like a scene from after the apocalypse! Not a soul in sight! And then I got to my desk, turned on my computer, checked my e-mail, and realized that we were on a delay. I wasn’t even supposed to be here! I felt pretty stupid, but how could I have known? I called my husband to let him know. “What are you going to do?” he asked. “I don’t know; work, I guess,” I said, muttering under my breath.
 
And then around 9 am, a second e-mail came out, stating that Penn State was closed for the day. Essential employees should report, but everybody else should stay home. The next day’s newspaper said it was the first time all-day classes at Penn State University Park had been cancelled since 2007.  And there I was, in the thick of it!
 
While I was in my office, I heard other voices, and went out to investigate. About a half-dozen other employees in my work area had also reported; had also left home prior to the e-mail being sent out, or had simply not been on e-mail yet that morning. So we commiserated. “You don’t KNOW what I WENT through to GET here this morning!” one of the new guys moaned; “That’s IT. I’m STAYING. I am WORKING today.”
 
You know, it’s a great thing to get a free day off work. But it’s even better if you have a way home. For myself, I was riding the bus because the travel conditions were awful; I was not going to ask my husband to try to drive in and retrieve me, as that would be defeating the whole point. Yes, I would be home early. But I couldn’t make it home until the next bus would take me there. And the next bus wouldn’t leave downtown until around 12:15 pm.
 
So I called up my husband, and I told him I would be home early. And he responded as any normal, red-blooded American husband living in the northeastern U.S. this winter WOULD respond, upon learning that his lovely wife would be arriving early to spend an unexpected, cozy afternoon at home. He gave a low chuckle and said, with great anticipation, “Great, you can help me SHOVEL!” (Ah, and they say that romance is dead . . . )
 
He asked if I thought the weather was bad enough that bus service might be cancelled for the day. I said I didn’t think so, but just in case, I high-tailed it on out of there in record time. Within 10 minutes, I was on the next bus that left my building, heading over to campus. I felt silly for showing up at work when there was a delay; I felt even worse about being there on a day when work was cancelled!
 
So I tried to think of something that would make me feel better, and the answer was clear and simple: FOOD! I had not had breakfast yet, and I was starving, so I planned to treat myself to the Early Bird Special at the Corner Room. I could walk around (as best I could, given the status of the sidewalks and parking lots and roads) taking some pictures, as well, on a campus that would be mostly deserted. (But not entirely deserted, as there were many other people, like me, who hadn’t gotten the message in a timely fashion.)
 
And so I had a beautiful breakfast at the Corner Room. Everything was perfect. The eggs were hot and just the right amount of dippy. The toast was crispy, and I slathered on some Smucker’s strawberry jam (not pictured). The home fries were hot and good, with just a hint of seasoning, and I ate them all up!
 
By 11:15, I had finished my breakfast, and was standing outside on the street. My husband had asked, rather plaintively, whether I couldn’t bring us back some McDonald’s fish sandwiches (currently on special for Lent, at 2 for $4) from downtown. Alas, I told him, the McDonald’s is clear on the other end of College Ave. from the Corner Room; and so, no, I was not planning to do that. But it turned out I did have enough time, and so I walked down College Ave., bought us four fish sandwiches for later, and tucked them into my daysack, where they left off a most pleasing aroma.
 
I had a bit of time, so I dawdled, which I hardly ever have time to do downtown. I checked out two of the wonderful murals downtown, took pictures. I watched a huge crane doing its work on the south human development building. I was like a little kid or an old man, stopping to look at EVERYthing.
 
And then, the most marvelous thing happened! I was standing at the bottom of the Old Main lawn, taking pictures, of course, when I saw a hawk FLY UP COLLEGE AVENUE. Technically, it was flying between College Ave. and “The Wall,” which is a brick wall that in past days was quite a social gathering spot. Back when I started at Penn State in the early 80s, you could still drink in public spaces, and people often did. You could see people sitting along The Wall with their beers. A few years into my experience, though, open containers were prohibited. So that dampened the festivities on The Wall a bit. The Wall is also known as the place where Alistair Fraser, a Penn State meteorology faculty member, used to parade up and down, playing Scotland the Brave (and other favorite tunes) on his bagpipes. Perhaps he still does.
 
Anyway, I saw the hawk, and I followed it to one of the big elms at the bottom of the Old Main lawn. But when I got there, it flew away and alas, I didn’t get a good shot. As I sat waiting for my bus, though, I saw it again. It had just flown one or two trees down. Had I known that, I would have pursued it further. But I didn’t know. Now I do, and I will keep an eye out for that hawk.
 
My bus arrived promptly at about 12:15 pm, and it turned out that I was the only passenger on the bus! So the bus driver and I had a lively conversation for the entire trip. Not about anything in particular, but sort of about everything. Isn’t it funny how bad weather can remove the usual social barriers and bring people together? And at the end, as I got off, I thanked him for the ride (as I always do; for we people of the hinterlands are very grateful for our bus service). And he thanked me for a lovely conversation. Such an old-fashioned thing: a pleasant chat among strangers.
 
I got off the bus around 1, and the first thing I saw as I approached our house was our mailbox lying in the road. The snow plow had just knocked it off, right before I got there. I picked it up and set it aside, then met my husband at the door (“Good news,” he said; "The roof is NOT leaking”), dropped my daysack (including the fish sandwiches for later) and camera off inside, and we spent the next two hours working on the drive way. The sleet and ice from the day before had formed a solid, frozen layer at least one to two inches thick on our 100-foot drive.
 
My husband got out the sturdy metal shovel, for none of the lightweight plastic ones could handle this mess without snapping. It was starting to warm up a bit by then, and so you could get the shovel in under the edges if you worked hard at it and were careful. There was nowhere to put the ice, as the drifts are so high now that you'd have to jump up to throw the snow out over. And besides, the icy mess was too heavy to lift. We just resigned ourselves to the fact that we would have to give up part of the drive. (This is how we spend our winters: waging the Battle of the Drive Way. After the snowstorm we had on Sunday, we cleared the drive way Monday. It remained clear for less than 24 hours. It is often a losing battle, and you feel lucky if you can get things back to where they were two days ago!)
 
And so we attacked the drive way the way that you might eat an elephant, which is to say, one bite at a time. At one point, I looked up at my husband and he said, “When I’m 80, I’m not doing this anymore. We’re moving to Key West and drinking piña coladas until our livers give out.” Which was pretty funny, considering that he never says things like that. Also considering that he hates extreme heat! And also considering that neither of us is a big piña colada fan. But standing there in the ice, I thought it sounded like a great plan. And so I shook my head: Yes, sure, of course, yes, yes, it’ll be Key West for us, baby! And continued to shovel the ice.
 
Around 3 pm, we were finally done. And we went inside and I looked at the clock and said, “Oh, OK, it’s 3 pm. I guess my TOTALLY FREE DAY begins now?!?” And I laughed. But it was sort of a bitter laugh. And we heated up a pair of fish sandwiches and ate them; for we were starving and exhausted, and the sandwiches were hot and good.

Later in the day, an announcement came out from Penn State that they probably could have been a bit more timely with their weather delay and cancellation notices, and that they would try to do better in the future. I read it to my husband, and he said, “You know, they NEVER cancel. So how could we EXPECT that they be good at something they hardly ever DO?” And he was right. But all told, it was a very strange day indeed.
 
In the last Blip where I talked about the Corner Room, my tale was one of a day in which everything went unexpectedly right, and where the timing on everything worked out to my best advantage. Delightfully so, in fact. Well, there are other kinds of days too: days when everything sort of . . . goes wrong, and you’re in the wrong place at the wrong time, which I guess I sort of . . . was. And that's OK too. That's life. Not every day can be sunny side up. But I did manage to make lemonade out of some of those lemons. I had some fun for at least part of the time, I got lots of pictures, and I enjoyed an unexpected treat: a simple but wonderful breakfast at the Corner Room.
 
I picked a Beatles tune for the Blip before this, the photo of the white field just before the storm began. And so we will bookend the END of this little storm with a tune by John Lennon. Nobody told me there’d be days like these . . . (And another few hours later, let it be noted that it began to snow . . .  again . . . But we’ll leave off on the story for now. For this is where this particular one ends.)