WEARE – Snowplow operators who have been dreaming of a white Christmas after last year's dismally dry winter haven't been disappointed lately.

But whether the winter is ultimately a boom or a bust for New Hampshire's road warriors is still very much in the hands of Mother Nature.

Since Dec. 13, three storms have buried much of New Hampshire in the white stuff, dumping from a few inches to a few feet in different parts of the state. Enormous piles of snow have clogged parking lots already congested with pre-Christmas traffic, and streets in both small towns and big cities are lined with walls of snow several feet high.

For Doug Knott of Merrimack, who owns Knott's Land Care, the sudden pileup of snow has meant little rest the past week.

"We've already put in 70 hours this week," he said yesterday. "We're exhausted."

Gary Balcom, owner of Balcom Brothers in Milford, which sells salt and sand to plow operators and local DPWs, is seeing this week's fatigue first hand.

"As I was loading up one guy's truck with salt, I noticed he had put his head down on the steering wheel and was fast asleep," Balcom said. "With weeks like this, you have to grab a few minutes of sleep whenever you can."

Balcom said he picked up a new front-end loader last Friday and had already clocked nearly 100 hours on the machine by yesterday.

"And I won't be done until sometime tomorrow," he said.

The abundance of the fluffy stuff has been a welcome sight to Russ Freeman of Weare who has been driving a plow for 20 years.

"I lost my shirt last year," he said, "but so far, this year's been excellent. Keep it coming."

Knott said that more snow doesn't necessarily mean more money in the bank for plow operators.

"A lot of what determines whether we make money or not depends on how the contracts with customers are written," he said.

Whether a plow operator is paid by the trip or by the storm can have an impact on the bottom line. A few inches of snow can be more profitable than a few feet if the driver is paid by the storm.

But Knott said he's been picking up extra work in addition to his regular customers because of the sheer volume of snow stacking up in parking lots.

"People have been hiring me to do snow removal, which is a lot more expensive than regular plowing because of the work involved," he said.

Fuel costs are also driving down profits a bit, said Freeman.

"The price of fuel is making things hard, so we have to raise the prices for our customers to try to cover it," he said. "But you can never really recoup the additional cost."

Whether the 2007/2008 snowplowing season is a moneymaker for drivers is still very much up in the air.

"We still have a lot of winter left," said Freeman. "It could not snow for the rest of the year. You never know."

Folks who moved to New Hampshire from less wintry climes in the past few years may think this year's snowfall is extraordinary, but Freeman said the past week is just a reminder of how living in the Granite State has always been.

"I've lived in New Hampshire all my life," he said. "This is normal snow. To me, this is a real New England winter."