>Winters where I live can be pretty brutal. Living in the Cascade foothills makes us particularly susceptible to kick-ass windstorms. For the last several days, we’ve been at the mercy of 35-mph winds with gusts ranging from 45-60 mph. Saturday night we lost power for 5 hours. Garbage cans and recycle bins have been careening down the parking lot. Roofing tiles are being wrenched from houses. Walking the dogs is like trying to run underwater. Christmas lights are even being torn from eaves and windowpanes. In the past we have had trees crashing through rooftops and blocking roadways.

However.

Despite the disabling winds that send your car swerving on the road.

Despite the objects flying at random.

Despite the trees bending dangerously in half.

Despite the inability to breathe with 60mph gusts flooding your nostrils.

There is…one man. Who despite the odds, perseveres, with super-human determination, to do what needs to be done.

That’s right.

My pal.
My buddy.
The man who seems to be a beggar to his own demise as he is out to destroy me every Monday morning at 7 a.m.

Dear God.

You ever see something so completely stupid that your brain, at the mere glimpse of it, begins to fold in upon itself?

Happened to me.

Sitting in my poofy oversized recliner, cozy by the fireplace, the scent of peppermint candles floating in the air, content at being safe and snug in my apartment whilst the trees are whipping violently in the wind and freezing rain is crashing against my windows.

Then I hear something.
Faint at first, then gaining volume…not quite sure what…

No no no no….can’t possibly be…

You’ve got to be fucking kidding me.

The sheer incredulity of it sent my mind reeling. A leaf-blower. In a windstorm.

I think someone needs to re-evealuate his terms of employment. Who does that? Seriously? There have got to be some kind of labor laws against blowing leaves in a windstorm. I mean, at least consider the psychological impact. Doing a job that is so completely futile, trying to complete a task that can never be completed (at least for a few days)…I mean, that cannot possibly good for one’s mental well-being, can it? Do they offer psychological counseling for leaf-blowers in such a situation? This is just so impossibly ridiculous I can’t even function.

Leaf-blower in a windstorm. What the hell.

I think I have may created a new metaphor. “Screen door on a submarine” is SO 5 years ago.

Get with it people. Use it. Share it. Spread it like wildfire.

Meanwhile I will be questioning the future of the human race.

Leaf-blower in a windstorm.

Christ.