Sigh!

You see that blue thing in the middle of the second picture? That is an actual City of Chicago Department of Streets and Sanitation Snow Truck. While we saw a lot of them last year, this is probably the second time I've seen them this winter - the winter that is already the snowiest winter of record.

Our mayor decided we didn't need to have our streets plowed as much as last year. He said it was a way to save money. Saving money is a good thing. And what was the reason to save this particular money? So the city could have services when it needed them. You know, like snow removal.

Snow did in Mayor Bilandic a couple of decades back when he didn't send the snow plows out after a storm. Yep, we shoveled his happy little a$$ right out with the rest of the flakes. Mayor Daley (who had been anointed mayor for life) overstepped a little bit. The snow combined with the pot craters (none of them are small enough to be merely holes) has gotten Chicagoans just a little cranky. It seems the mayor has revisited that whole 'you all don't need the street cleaned just because it snowed' edict.

We canceled our StitchCraft meeting today because the snow looked a lot worse this morning. I was going to bring the blanket that I'm working on. The one that didn't want to be made (see 'The Road to Hell') I'm going to be about a skein short of what I need so yesterday I took a trip to Hobby Lobby to get the needed skein of 'I Love This Yarn' in grape.

I do love that yarn. So much so that I will travel to the closest Hobby Lobby which is 25 miles away. I went at rush hour - that wasn't so bad. They've moved into a more spacious store and the yarn department is way bigger and it was my first visit there and I was quite thrilled until I got to where the grape yarn should have been...

and there was none.

Zip. Zero. Nada. Rien.

Not even a spare skein sticking the back. Not even a misplaced one in the bins on either side. Who the hell buys out all the grape yarn except me? I stared at the hole where the yarn should have been. And the hole stared back.

The very nice lady checked all the bins and then asked me to wait while she went to check the stocking list to see when it would come in. She came back to me with the list in her hand and pointed to 'I Love This Yarn' 'Grape' and then the letters T.O. "Do you know what that means?" she asked.
"Terrell Owens has all the grape yarn?"
"Temporarily out. There's none to be had. Can't even order it. We ordered last week and didn't get it either."
Sigh.
"Why don't you call us next Thursday to see if it came in?"
I thanked her for her kindness and did not add: Because next Thursday this blanket would have been totally reworked and I won't need that yarn; that's why.

I obviously could not travel 25 miles for nothing. So I did get some yummy bulky weight yarns that will make beautiful shawls and throws - yes, I know - but it's bulky weight. I need that.