Death from Above

In my last blog I mentioned that I've fallen because of slippery sidewalks three times now on my adventure in Eastern Europe. I previously thought that this was the most perilous part of living in a country where snow-maintenence is fairly non-existant...oh how wrong I was. Up until now, I have been looking down and watching my feet as I try to climb my way over the drifts of snow, skate down small hills sheeted with ice, and basically make it from point A to point B without fracturing my tailbone. I figured, it's good to be cautious, "watch you're where your walking". About four days ago, we had a 2 day long blizzard that dropped about a foot and a half of snow on Tallinn. Since then it has been warming up a bit, and the snow is melting, making the ice underneath quite slippery.

I recently learned, however, that the cause of most winter calamities is falling icicles from the rooftops above. Apparently some people have died due to being impaled by giant shards of ice as they plummet to the earth. As the temperature increases, the fear of being skewered by an icicle rises proportionatly. The kind Estonian people have taken to roping off particularly dangerous areas, or just placing blockades to prevent people from walking under these frozen nasties. Unfortunatley, this forces us all to walk in the middle of the road where we now must dodge traffic as it too slips and slides on the thawing snow and ice. Basically, going outside is like playing Russian Roulette.

Now, I must watch my feet for ice and drifts, the sky for falling knives of ice, and both ways at all time for cars. I'm starting to feel a little paranoid, and my neck is beginning to hurt. I might buy cleats...or maybe a helmet.

*Pics: http://www.physics.utoronto.ca/~smorris/edl/icicleripples/icicle_out2.jpg,