In winter 2008-9, it snowed a lot. Roads became long slides of ice, work everywhere was canceled, and the city effectively shut down for days. But perhaps the most memorable part of Seattle's snowstorm wasn't the snow itself. It was the Seattle Times’ shit-flipping response to the city’s cleanup. It took too long. The roads around their offices were unnavigable. They couldn't get to the neeeeeewz fast enough! So then-mayor Greg Nickels became the target for their ire. Coincidentally enough, he wasn't re-elected (CONSPIRACY?????!!!!). Now, many argue that the snow storm and its Times-stoked discontents paved the way for Mike McGinn to become mayor.

So I was curious about whether this week's three-inch "snowstorm" might be similarly bad news for McGinn. Yesterday, I popped over to the Times to get a visual on their surrounding roads and survey some of their scribblers. It was icy but the roads were clear. I wanted to know: Will the paper demand a new changing of the guard based of McGinn's snow-plowing performance?

Like good reporters, most sidestepped my presence questions. According to one employee, Maureen Jude, the snow wasn’t as bad as last year, so the two mayors couldn't possibly be compared.

Mr. Mark “That’s all I’m giving you” said the city’s roads weren’t terrible, but the freeways were sucky (clearly, unlike his colleagues, he hadn't discovered the hope, the lifeline that Twitter can be in these situations). An anonymous man told me that Nickel’s and McGinn’s responses were incomparable - less snow, but there were problems just the same.

Rumblings of discontent? The creak of the political guillotine for McGinn? Stay tuned.