Sidewalk Shoveling

Okay, so we've had a very mild winter, to put it lightly. My tulips are already coming up and it's only March. For those of you reading this who don't know, winter here lasts until June. Anyway, now that we've had some real snow, one of my other pet peeves (I know there are quite a few) is that people seem physically and mentally unable to shovel the snow on their sidewalks.

I don't expect miracles, and that a person should be out shoveling snow when it is still coming down, or to dig themselves out of a six-foot snow drift, but after a day I do expect sidewalks to be clear. Being a student and walking to campus, I usually have to park a few to several blocks out. Walking down the street in anything other than gym shoes proves completely hazardous. What makes it worse is that lots of other students have tramped their way over the snow and with a day like yesterday when the sun came out and melted half of it, this turns to ice quickly. What really irks me though, is when people shovel one little path right down the middle of the sidewalk and nothing else. I know I should give them the benefit of the doubt that maybe they just were in a hurry or didn't have time to completely clear their sidewalks. But when several days go by and they still haven't cleared out the rest, I get really mad.

It's not completely the fault of the homeowners though either. While the Laramie Police Dept. is happy to write students tickets for parking in the designated permit parking places, it never and I mean never, gives out citations for people not clearing their sidewalks. I should purposely trip, fall, break my hip and sue both the city and the homeowner so maybe more attention would be paid to those people who are too damn lazy to get out their dusty shovel and move some snow.

Okay, my rant is done. Now I feel better.