Winter has been dragging on for quite a while now. And it’s been a particularly bad winter, at least in terms of snowfall.
If you purchased a TLC Inc. snow removal insurance policy before winter hit, the extra snowfall is hardly any skin off your nose. It just means you’re getting more for your money. The more it snows, the better the payoff from your snow insurance investment.
But if you’ve been doing your own snow removal, you’re probably getting pretty sick of it at this point. You’re probably wanting rather desperately to be done with it.
Desperate Times Call for Desperate Measures…
Some inventor was apparently feeling much the same sense of desperation back in 1925. So much so that he was inspired to invent a rather strange snow-removal gizmo. This inventor, you see, had the bright idea of using fire to eradicate snow from walkways and driveways.
The device he invented was called a “Snow Burner.” Here’s how it worked: You trudged through the snow pulling the Snow Burner behind you. The device sprinkled calcium carbide upon the snow, and set it afire, melting the snow. (Which would then refreeze as treacherously slick ice, wouldn’t it!?)
The Snow Burner did come with a few drawbacks.
It was recommended, for example, that the operator of the Snow Burner take care always to “head into any slight breeze which may be blowing, so that his own clothes will not be ignited.” Excellent advice.
You also needed to be careful where you operated the Snow Burner. Operating it in proximity to houses, shrubbery and trees were not recommended. Those restrictions cut down just a bit on the utility of the Snow Burner, unless you happened to live in an igloo in the barren arctic wastes.
And if the wind was blowing, it was recommended that you avoid using the Snow Burner altogether, lest you inadvertently clear the snow for the entire neighborhood – and involve the local fire department in your snow-clearing activities.
Keep Your Desperation in Check
Now, if you’re weary unto death of doing your own snow removal – that weariness can start to play with your head. It might even get you to thinking that outlandish ideas like the Snow Burner might be worth trying.
Careful, though. Take our advice: Just gut it up and stick with your tried-and-true snow shovels and snow blowers. The bulk of the winter is behind us. Spring is not far away. It may not seem like it now, but you can make it the rest of the way. We know you can.
Just take heart in the knowledge that you don’t ever have to go through this again. Give us a call, and arrange to have TLC handle your snow removal for next winter. Make record snowfalls our problem, not yours.
After all, you’re really wishing right now that you had made that call a few months ago, aren’t you?