Legal White Powder Found in Atlanta

Where I used to live in New York, snow was a welcome addition to the dreariness of winter. For about five minutes. That’s about how long it took for all the frolicking adults to realize it was the start of months of shoveling, skidding across multiple lanes of traffic (note, this particular problem is not limited to snow and ice on Long Island), dodging wayward snowballs, and constantly chasing after smaller kids and trying to explain why they shouldn’t eat yellow snow.

One of the reasons we chose Atlanta as our new home is that it doesn’t really get any snow. Until now. As soon as we arrived, someone came up with the novel idea – an idea so crazy it’s a miracle Ted Turner isn’t involved – of covering a giant hill at Stone Mountain Park (named after native Georgian Civil War General Stone M. Park) with the powdery white stuff. After taking measurements, officials decided using snow would be easier and “slightly more legal.” Thus Coca-Cola’s Snow Mountain was born.

I’m not one to brag about my foresight, considering I haven’t had any since I was a seven days old (shout out to Rabbi Yehoshua Krohn!), but it seems obvious to me that this plan was flawed from the start.

For one, I loosely understand the physics of ground temperature and snowfall (no I don’t), and I’m familiar with what constitutes cold enough weather to sustain snow outdoors (it has to be really, really cold). Okay, I’m not even sure the rules are considered part of physics – they may be calculus or pharmacology, but the point is that according to the most recent Farmer’s Almanac, “Not only does Atlanta get maybe a dusting of snow at a time, if that… the city shuts down like a bathroom after Rosie O’Donnell stops in for a number two when any trace of snow is in the forecast, so everyone can go to Publix to get milk and bread.”

In order to create this winter wonderland in the heat of the Bible Belt, organizers imported a battalion of snow-making machines – the same kind you’d find on a mountain in Vermont or New Hampshire during the ski season, which generally comprises fall, winter, spring and most of summer. They do not use these machines during the two weeks known locally as ‘Quick: we can swim’ when temperatures are likely to reach as high as 62 degrees.

The blowers were fired up on October 2, which happened to be the same day that Georgia Governor Sonny Perdue declared October "Take a Shorter Shower" month due to the current drought. He also suggested not running the water while brushing your teeth, but that one seems to be pretty well covered already here in Georgia. According to statistics, the average person can save between three and seven gallons of water by skipping their legs below the knees while taking a shower. Over the course of a year that amounts to more than 2,000 gallons – which can be used by Pepsi, Coca-Cola’s biggest competitor, to fill 12,810 sport bottles of Aquafina water.

In spite of the drought, the snow machines were firing full-fledged snow, which when mixed with the 80 degree weather that day turned into full-fledged water before hitting the ground at a rate of 38 gallons per minute, in effect creating the world’s most elaborate lawn sprinkler system.

Finally bowing to the public outrage of wasting a total of 1.2 million gallons of water as the community deals with a drought of epic proportions, the park has decided to halt its lawn-watering program. Displaying a profound understanding of the situation, Stone Mountain Park’s public relations manager Christine Parker said, “We've already sold tickets, and we can't just stop. That would be like a water park just deciding to turn off the faucets.” (Humor writing is easy when you have quotes like this to work with.)

After paying the equivalent of the combined annual tourism revenue of the entire Caribbean to promote Snow Mountain, Coca-Cola publicly endorsed the decision to call it off. In related news, Stone Mountain Park is in sponsorship talks with other soft drink companies.

Now disappointed children across the Atlanta region will be forced to wonder what getting snow caked under your shirt collar, head first at a high rate of speed feels like and they’ll never know the joy in getting knocked over by a snow-tuber who has gone astray as they try to climb back up the hillside in the slippery snow, but they will always remember the time when politics got in the way of a good time, thanks to Governor Sonny Perdue – a man who wasn’t chicken to say what he felt. (Come on, how can I let a name like this slip by twice without saying anything?)