Buffalo Rips Philly

You know you've had a storm for the ages when a picture of some Philly Samaritans pushing a cab out of a snow bank runs on the front page -- of  The Buffalo News.

Up there in Helsinki by Lake Erie they've been getting a charge out of the way we relative Southerners have been dealing with our record dusting.

Today's top story in Buffalo begins:

"They're calling it Snowmageddon, Snowpocalypse and Snoverkill."

Snow joke.

A young Buffalo-area woman recently transplanted to Philly told her hometown paper via e-mail:

"For some reason Philly doesn't seem to realize they are in the Northeast, and should expect snow, so they end up bumbling through each storm," Ashley Holt wrote. "No one seems to sell shovels either, which makes clearing a parking spot for your car with a dust pan and a recycling bin lid an interesting experience."

In the interest in sharing their expertise - and it's real expertise as Buffalo averages 97 inches of snow a year - our friends at the Buffalo broadsheet offered us a few tips for dealing with the snow.

It's not necessary to buy up all the bread, milk and toilet paper in the area, they suggested.

If your power goes out, cool a couple of six-packs in the snow. My son did this last night - learned the trick in Michigan. We're still without heat or electricity, by the way, but there's lots of beer.

Brush off the roof of your car so you don't blind the person behind you. This makes some sense. As does shoveling after the plow goes by, not before.

But this last one was real head-scratcher.

Enjoy the camaraderie of those who join you in excavating a buried car.

Clearly they're not from here.

This morning, which was great driving because there were so few people on the road for an 8 a.m. commute, I was jarred out of my self-satisfaction by a loud horn. It was the guy behind me at a light. The problem, I pointed out, was the guy in front of us - his sedan was slipping in the slush. I got out of my car and helped push the guy's car. The horn-leaner behind us, in some giant SUV, didn't budge. Neither did the Mitsubishi. Finally I pointed at the guy behind me and motioned him to get out of his car and give us a hand if he wanted to get anywhere.

He did. Never made eye contact or said a word the whole time. Neither did the guy we pushed. Then we were all on our way, Philly-style.

And while we're at it, we might want to put our thumb on the scale, so to speak, and enter this WBEN poll about Philly having more snow than Buffalo this year.