Fight the white menace

If you do end up slipping, here’s a visual guide for how to do it./ Neil Adams

Stop slipping and start shovelling!

Neil Adams 

The City of Regina’s Snowbuster program is all about helping your neighbors. Every winter, you can nominate someone you believe is a good ‘snowfighter’. This could be your neighbor, who takes good care of the sidewalk, or the guy down the street that shovels that little old lady’s path.

Removing snow from sidewalks is a public service. Canada Post carriers are a brave and hardy lot, but it’s up to us to make their jobs a little easier by clearing the snow from our walkways and making sure they can get at our mailboxes. I myself live on a street with high foot traffic and a fair number of seniors around, so I make sure that my walk is shoveled. Granted, the city ripped up my sidewalk in the fall and never bothered to replace it, so there’s a lumpy, gravelly bit in the middle that I can’t do much about, but I’m trying. Actually, I pay a guy to do my shoveling. He’s nice, he’s got a bad leg, so he’s just the pitchman, but he’s got buddies that do the rest, and they do a good job. So, I guess I’m not a very good snowfighter. My back gate barely opens and my alley is a total mess to the point where I can hardly get the garbage cart out. Home ownership is work, man.

So what can you, the student, do to be a better snowbuster? All of you lazy millennials that park on Darke Cres. can help clean it up. I think it’s a safe bet to say that the city never plows Darke, so maybe you should do it. Keep a shovel in your car and at the end of your day, clear out some of the filth and detritus, as parking makes dripping and dripping makes gross black snow. Homeowners on Darke Cres. have suffered enough with your shit.

I see those buckets of sand that say ‘lend a hand, toss some sand!’ but I’ve never seen anyone do it. I know that you’re thinking, “Ew! Sand is gross! Why would you touch it? Ew.” There are some people on campus that don’t have the balance and grace of a gazelle, so they need fricative surfaces on which to waddle. So, when you fall on your ass and scuff your nice jeans, don’t say I didn’t warn you. If you want something done, you could wait around and hope that someone else will do it and maybe fall on your ass walking from your car to school, or you could just do a teeny tiny amount of manual work yourself and be done with it. This isn’t America; you can’t sue someone (as easily) if you fall on your ass. 
Fighting snow is everyone’s responsibility. If you’re good at it, the city might reward you. If you don’t do it at all, you deserve all that sniggering and laughter when you slip and fall and spill your latte.

Here’s a tip for you guys: my wife is involved in the Pile O’ Bones Derby Club roller derby league. She always tells me that if I’m going to fall on my ass, I should “pick a cheek” and try to land in a sitting position. Don’t try to break your fall with your hands, because you’ll break your wrist. Derby girls are experts in falling on their asses so ask a derby girl you know to teach you. The human ass was built to absorb impacts, so use it.