Super Snowy Saturday and Sunday [updated]

Yep, that's right - did I say spring was coming? - this weekend we got slammed.

Saturday I slept in till 6:30 because I was planning on using the Internet at La Maison de l'Université before it closed at noon. Then I looked out my window... then I looked out the door... then I decided it was a good day to learn some flexibility. It was the heaviest, slushiest, most-wet-possible snow without being rain and it was coming down pretty good. Nevertheless, I did venture out, to investigate the market (at my host mom's suggestion - "Go see all the cheeses"), then to the museum I had already visited, because somewhere in that building were a second and third floor for the contemporary art section and I hadn't gotten to that. So I figured out the floor plan around 11:00 a.m., just in time to find the sign informing me that the contemporary art section was closed from 11:30 till 1:45. Forget it, then, I like to wander at my own sweet will and pace through a museum... I'll come back another time.

Sunday morning we woke up to blue skies and lots of snow: heaped on the buildings and dumped on the cars and courtyards, no wind to sculpt and drift like in Iowa. All day there were people outside snapping pictures and children playing in the snow. After church, the +20-year-olds dashed outdoors for a snowball fight. I wish you could have seen the cars with a foot of snow on top. After a morning of sunshine, when we left church, whoosh slid a huge clump right down the windshield! Apparently this kind of dump is very rare in France, hasn't been seen in years.

Now, you will want to check this same post tomorrow because I plan to link some pictures. Sadly I didn't take any till Sunday afternoon, so don't expect anything very impressive. Add several inches of snow to compensate for the morning melting and you'll have a good idea. Incredible how I've avoided posting any pictures up till now, huh?

Stand by for the update.......


7/3/06, 9:56 AM Mardi (Tuesday)

And here are a few pictures from Sunday afternoon:

Our courtyard, from our doorway.

L'Hotel de Ville, that is, the courthouse, which used to be the palace of the dukes of Burgundy. La Place de la Libération, the 'square' (semi-circle) in front of it, is currently under construction.

And I forget what this is, but it looks magnificent, doesn't it?

Add six inches of snow to this car to imagine what it was like in the morning. This one's a little better.

Another side of that magnificent building.

A street in Dijon (lots of fun to slush along in boots).

This is my street - Rue Vauban.

And this is the courtyard of our set of apartments, from just inside the gate.

And here's our apartment. Yep, all those windows belong to my host family! Home sweet home in Dijon, France.