Snow shoveling behavior among apartment dwellers

First out are what we call the premature excavators, who come out before the storm has ended. They begin moving cars and creating paths at the crack of dawn. Some need to go out; others are just anal.

Next come the overachievers. Within minutes of the snow stopping and the wind dying down, they're digging out their cars and sweeping off their patios and balconies.

The half slackers come out in the next several hours, provoked by feelings of worthlessness and guilt after having spent the past couple hours watching the first two groups diligently scraping and brushing every last snowflake off their cars. Many in this group have to go out anyway since, not having sufficiently prepared themselves for the storm, they are out of vital necessities like food.

The slackers come out right before they have to leave for work the following day. The snow has melted and then frozen onto their cars so they start the engines and employ scrapers to get the frozen gunk off. Typically, they are less fussy than the members of the first three groups and they often resort to brute force, driving back and forth over the piles of snow left behind their cars by the snowplows until they manage to get their cars out.

The last group comprises the drunks, the shut-ins, the unemployed and the dead. They never clean off their cars.