CAMDEN — If this had not been a school vacation week, there is little doubt school would have been called off once again with the snow falling at such a quick clip around bus pickup time this morning, and the forecast calling for a day of snow.

At 6 a.m., there was just a dusting of snow on cars, but within 90 minutes, those vehicles had become buried under at least another 3 inches of snow. And it kept falling, sometimes lightly, sometimes heavily.

It's hard to know for sure how much this latest storm system gave the Midcoast this morning, because it's all starting to blur into one pile of whiteness that has ceased to phase us by its continued growth up to and in front of our porch windows.

But oh, what a difference a few hours can mean when your hamlet is on the following edge of a large low, moving northeast. The Midcoast remains under a winter storm warning until 1 a.m. tomorrow, Friday, with the chance of light snow lingering into the evening, especially for areas near the coast.

The National Weather Service's updated forecast, at 9:44 a.m., called for snowfall to taper off by noon, and that it did, almost to the minute.

And the sunshine - it's so bright, we really need sunglasses and window blinds to deal with the glare and shock of it. We have become so accustomed to gray skies, it's like emerging from a trip to Longyearbyen, Svalbard, Norway, the world's northernmost settlement where polar night is from approximately Oct. 27 to Feb. 14, and the sun is not visible until around March 8.

But, it feels good, and we'll take that sun and the bit of warmth it brings us through the glass panes.

This year, Camden's annual work to deposit its plowed snow it into the harbor, coupled with persistent cold weather and little-to-no melting days, have caused ice in the harbor to combine with the snow to create jams and wedges. The snow is deposited into the harbor between the fisherman's ramp and the transient dock, and that's where Camden Harbormaster Steve Pixley said he learned some of the docks that remain in the water throughout the winter had, or were in danger of breaking free.

"The snow was piled up, and the frozen harbor was preventing it from moving with the tide out into Penobscot Bay, and that was causing pressure on the roller chains that hold the floats and docks in place. Schooner Capt. Garth Wells helped me with the head-of-the-harbor docks out to the Angelique, Lewis R. French and Mary Day," said Pixley. "Then I made a valiant leap to the ones that tie up to the four fisherman's floats and with help from schooner Capt. Ray Williamson, we secured those in place."

It's never a dull moment here on the coast of Maine — and we like it that way.

Reach Editorial Director Holly S. Edwards at hollyedwards@penbaypilot.com