Nothing justifies a slanket, heebie.
The windchill's below zero right now.
It's been 65 out all day here in the District. I'm loving winter right now.
The advisory is for freezing rain and light freezing drizzle. Please use caution when driving.
Road trip! If you don't head out for ribs and longnecks and drive back sliding all over the road, hootin' and hollerin' the whole time, then you ain't got a hair on your ass.
Oooo. Perfect conditions for a nasty ice storm.
Which means you can use your amazing slanket skills to build a giant planet-shattering laser to bore your way out from under the ice.
max
['The World of Null Heebster.']
JP Stormcrow's ass looks like a slanket.
I'm studyin' on it. Remind me again, how many holes does a slanket have?
Supercooled Arctic air is being channeled westward through the Columbia Gorge, which focuses it with laser-like intensity across Northeast Portland and directly at the back of my house. Relentlessly. I really need to insulate this place.
It's supposed to rain and maybe even snow in NYC. WTF.
10: Part of the plan, actually.
It was in the low 60s today in Boston. That's insane. And great for my first winter here. It reminds me of home...
pwnd! and by a nameless person too
It's been 65 out all day here in the District. I'm loving winter right now.
Just wait; we had that warm weather last night and this morning, and Chicago had it yesterday.
Actually we've been rather cold and snowy (no big accumulations, but frequent small amounts) and sleety in the 'burgh. I meant to put up my new 100-ft long 7-ft. tall "fuck you deer" mesh fence before Thanksgiving, but the early cold (and my everlasting sloth) deterred me. They usually don't go for the big, old Rhodedendrons until we get a really cold, snowy spell in January or February, but noticed this weekend that they had alread started in on them* this year. So I spent Sunday mucking around with the boys in the melty mud rigging it up (and the fucking fuckers will probably knock it down or otherwise subvert it anyhow).
* For my first 15 years in the house they never touched them. (I know, I know, increased population pressure and all of that, but there were shitload of them around back then as well. I think they're *LEARNING* and will kill us all some day.)
A number of my colleagues have been without power since Friday and are not looking forward to the return of below-freezing temperatures.
It's supposed to rain and maybe even snow in NYC. WTF.
It's December. You were expecting . . . ?
You'll be ok, ben. Wear a sweater.
JL!
It's December. You were expecting . . . ?
Well, I was in DC for a couple days last december and the december before that, and it was neither raining nor snowing. I assure you, I have a sweater.
It's raining cats and dogs in San Diego. If this isn't a sign of climate change...
and the fucking fuckers will probably knock it down or otherwise subvert it anyhow
Deer mostly laugh at "fuck you deer" fences. Just be glad they don't have opposable thumbs.
2 days ago it was 25 here, now it's 45.
Lots of rain. I think that the third time my landlord fixed the leaks in ceiling he also actually fixed the leak in the roof that was causing the leaks in the ceiling, because it's been almost a month and the plaster or whatever it is hasn't caved in yet.
22: Just be glad they don't have opposable thumbs.
yet
I don't think it has gotten above freezing today in Dallas. Covered the outdoor faucets.
We aren't prepared for this. Could get down to jeez 60 in the house tonight. I'm really scared.
We'll get in one room with electronics blazing like chestnuts and cuddle with the dogs. Watch Terminator together.
We just had 10" of snow over the weekend and I just biked home in -12 F temps. Winter is fun.
"Lots of it" being by local (rather than, say, Fargo) standards. We'll probably have a couple inches by morning.
I hope that it does snow here. I've been told that I'll regret that wish, but I love the snow and there wasn't any where I grew up, and there wasn't much in undergrad land so I'm ok with the presumptive foolishness.
26: If you're going to do winter, do it properly!
My main worry about any sort of just-barely-freezing that can happen here is nobody in this city has any idea how to deal with it, or more acutely, drive in it. I don't want to need to get anywhere in that case
As the temperature comes tumbling down, I will be serving us a suitably stodgy dinner of cheese and nut loaf. I haven't made it in ages, but whenever we have it I feel we are truly partaking of British vegetarian culinary heritage. (It also, surprisingly enough, tastes very good.)
My main worry about any sort of just-barely-freezing that can happen here is nobody in this city has any idea how to deal with it
Nobody knows how to drive in that. It just sucks.
Much of the weather being described in this thread, btw, is the result of the same pattern, which is a series of storm systems brewing in the north Pacific and swinging in across California and the Southwest one after another.
25: Winter/Terminator party at the mcmanus crib!
If you want to track snow depth and precipitation in the US, use these two great NOAA sites.
34:There had been a real paucity of snow in much of the West until this recent bout.
There had been a real paucity of snow in much of the West until this recent bout.
Indeed. The unseasonable warmth was nice, but we were getting worried.
5 -> 31. But in general also what CJB says.
First real winter since I got back. -17 F at 10 am. I spent a total of about 5 minutes outside over a 20 minute period and my toes are still a little sensitive.
Big low to the north of us late last week and over the weekend pulled a lot of rain and wind this way. Lots of flooding in some areas, as tends to happen when it's coming down three or four inches an hour. Now it's no longer stormy, but still pulling warm air up from the south, making for another night of sweaty sleeping last night after we thought that was finally over for the year.
I correct myself. Not ice stormy in central/north Texas, not even particularly cold, just ice patches in the dark. Memphis just might get creamed tho.
Next week around Sunday is the next biggie.
max
['DC: wet and dreary.']
32: Don't tell CA. He will bust out the Crank's cookbook on me.
My Yahoo/Weather Channel Severe Weather Alert is threatening me with "Unknown Precipitation"
What, like a kind of precipitation that has never been seen before? "Wow, Jim Cantore in Dallas, what the heck is that stuff?"
"Rain/Sleet/Snow" fits the space.
I'll never tell. However, if ever you need to produce a Vegetarian-Society-worthy nut loaf that actually tastes good, I'll hook you up!
Yesterday's snowstorm was the exactly the kind of weather that has people from snow country smiling smugly and staying the hell off the streets. All it takes is about a quarter inch to shut Portland down, and we got a fair bit more than that.
What, like a kind of precipitation that has never been seen before? "Wow, Jim Cantore in Dallas, what the heck is that stuff?"
Cats and dogs? Cloudy with a chance of meatballs?
As always, Philadelphia's weather is halfway between DC's and New York's. We are condemned to never ever being featured on national news for any weather story .
Ha! I say again: Ha!
You people (with the exception of Emerson, and read when she shows up) don't know ANYTHING about winter. It's so cold here that the snow is slippery -- not the slush, not the ice, the snow itself has lost any property of coarse granularity and is doing its best to act frictionless. And it isn't even really that cold yet! Virtually no one around here will have frozen pipes tonight. Almost no homeless people will freeze to death. Small children will still frolic outside, and there are probably one or two idiot frat boys wandering around campus in shorts and flip-flops.
||
In unrelated news, Intermedia Arts, a really great gallery and organizing art space here in Minneapolis is basically shutting down today for lack of funds. I am so sick of this shit! Vital, important arts organizations that have been around for 35 years should not be packing up like thieves in the night! What the fuck is wrong with everyone? I am so fucking pissed off right now.
||>
Okay, I guess they haven't completely shut down yet, but laying off all paid staff and closing regular hours is hardly a good sign. Fuck Tim Pawlenty.
Read's home town Ulan Bator probably is the coldest large (400,000+)city in the world. A few cities in Siberia may beat it, depending on how you calculate -- coldest mean January or December temperature? Lowest temperature ever recorded? A friend of mine says that -60 is not uncommon.
Winnipeg is the champion outside Siberia and Mongolia.
You people (with the exception of Emerson, and read when she shows up) don't know ANYTHING about winter.
I beg your pardon.
Anyway, I'm weather-talked out. Except, freezing rain tomorrow night. 'Smasher et al. in DC, take note.
44: There ain't no prose like Federal Meteorological Handbook prose:
8.1 General
Present weather includes precipitation, obscurations, well-developed dust/sand whirls, squalls, tornadic activity, sandstorms, and duststorms. Present weather may be evaluated instrumentally, manually, or through a combination of instrumental and manual methods.
8.2 Scope
This chapter prescribes the standards for observing and reporting present weather. The types of present weather reported vary according to the type of station defined by the responsible agency.
8.3 Present Weather Parameters
8.3.1 Precipitation. Precipitation is any of the forms of water particles, whether liquid or solid, that fall from the atmosphere and reach the ground. The types of precipitation are:
...
i. Unknown Precipitation. Precipitation type that is reported if the automated station detects the occurrence of light precipitation but the precipitation discriminator cannot recognize the type.
As you suggest, in practice this usually means some manner of very light snow/sleet/drizzle/fog/rain.
unknown precipitation
Obviously oobleck. Don't you people know anything?
"Won't be rain.
Won't be snow.
Won't be fog.
That's all we know."
Weather language is actually very great, descriptions of hurricanes in particular. Up in New England we call unknown precipitation "spitting."
It's, er, 40-ish (in fahrenheit) here. It was colder a few days ago, though. Was down to about 26 (fahrenheit).
It's raining in L.A. The fucking Beach Boys lied!
My Yahoo/Weather Channel Severe Weather Alert is threatening me with "Unknown Precipitation"
What, like a kind of precipitation that has never been seen before? "Wow, Jim Cantore in Dallas, what the heck is that stuff?"
Reminds me of the signs on the turnpike: "NEW TRAFFIC PATTERNS NEXT 15 MILES"
I always say "Cool, new traffic patterns! Can't wait to see what they've come up with!"
It's 59 degrees here, but apparently there's freezing rain one state to the west.
"Cool, new traffic patterns! Can't wait to see what they've come up with!"
Plaid.
It's raining in L.A. The fucking Beach Boys lied!
Not the Beach Boys.
http://music.aol.com/album/It-Never-Rains-in-Southern-California/32742?flv=1
I'm thinking that the rain might mean snow up in the mountains, which means I might be able to take PK to see snow again next week. We took him to "sledding at the (santa barbara) zoo" last week, and he was PISSED that it was a teensy little mound of snow on top of a few hay bales.
Snow level down to 2000 ft, B.
It's raining in L.A. The fucking Beach Boys lied!
Which Beach Boys lied? They wrote so many.
Weather language is actually very great, descriptions of hurricanes in particular.
The NWS in Buffalo puts up nice descriptions of individual lake snow effects off of Lakes Erie and Ontario. They even give them names like hurricanes, but don't talk about them that way in public lest they be revealed as hopeless fucking nerds.
People have alluded to it, but I see no solid mention of Chicago's pattern, which went from 50s yesterday to single digits (all F, of course) this morning, and is due to rise back into the balmy 20s tomorrow.
66: Yeah, I'm not a weather nerd, but have a friend who is, and who posts absolutely astonishing descriptions about the swirly and the pressure point and the giving and the taking.
68: You can find those narratives in Nerve magazine.
68: They coin good words as well. One of my favorites is "bombogenesis" (cyclogenesis taken to the extreme). Many Nor'easters involve bombogenesis fuled by cold polar air encountering warm Gulf air (don't know if the development of last week's storm was rapid and intense enough to rise to the "bomb" level, but it was the right kind of pattern).
They even give them names like hurricanes, but don't talk about them that way in public lest they be revealed as hopeless fucking nerds.
Surely their fears are unfounded. Who would consider it nerdy to talk about the lake effects of snow?
Buffalo gets a lot of snow, of course. More than Toronto, I think, or that's what I've always heard.
(When I was a kid, we thought Toronto had a mild and temperate climate, because we'd go there in March and most of their snow had already melted. Already?! But it's not even Easter...).
Only getting up in the 20's around here lately. One way to warm up is to get all manic and run up and down your street trying to get in the neighbor's doors. Then a couple of cops will get to warm up by wrestling you to the ground and helping EMT strap you to a gurney.
71: Yeah, Buffalo (and other places between the two) gets more snow than Toronto. I remember going to northern Ohio in March and finding it balmy for much the same reason. God, I do not miss snow, but for some reason my sicko kid does.
53: instrumentally, manually, or through a combination of instrumental and manual methods
Heh heh, oh yeah, those meteorologists know what they're up to.
Here in Shallow Alto it's pretty cold and damp. By CA standards. On the connection here I think I saw the twin apocalyptic omens of the Qantas A380 in LAX and water in the LA river.
Here in Shallow Alto
Aren't you jaded after such a short time.
Here is a map of average snowfall in the Great Lakes region. (Here is a more readable one, but it covers just the Erie & Ontario belts.) You can see the increases south and east of the lakes. Toronto is relatively snow-free (and also sunnier). The same effect that produces the snows also produces a surfeit of cloudy and drizzly weather across a broader region (basically starting about Cleveland and extending east to the Alleghenies and Adirondacks).
77: The first link is password-protected.
Winter patterns in the Pacific Northwest are similar, but with warmer, wetter air the snow levels are generally higher and drop even greater amounts of (usually heavy, wet) snow* in the highest elevations. The inland mountains and ski areas generally get the benefit of much lighter, fluffier powder.
*Hence "Sierra Cement" on the slopes.
Aren't you jaded after such a short time.
Actually I picked this up from someone in my dept who is an old canary or cassowary or whatever the bird is.
77: The first link is password-protected.
Hmm. Fourth link in this search. Labeled "Climate: Impacts of the Great Lakes", it works from Google...
Here in the real Portland (Maine) we just had an record setting warm day of 55 melt off the 1/2 inch of ice that fell Thursday. We've been having lows in the single digits and highs in the 20s for a little bit, interspersed with strangely warm days. The power isn't fully restored here yet, and my neighbor who works for a major tree contractor is making huge amounts of overtime.
80: Curmudgeon?
(where does that word come from anyway? I know it's not a bird.)
Labeled "Climate: Impacts of the Great Lakes", it works from Google...
Hm, so it does. Odd.
I think you can just say "old bird".
83: The Wikipedia entry is useless for etymology but kind of hilarious, consisting mostly of a list of well-known curmudgeons ("fictional and non-fictional"). Wiktionary just says the etymology's unknown.
Johnson's suggestion that it is from Fr. coeur mechant "evil heart" is no longer taken seriously
"Old bat" is only considered appropriate to describe women.
Maybe that's what he means, despite more recent sources disputing the Bible's classification of bats as birds.
87: From the Online Etymology Dictionary. Wrong but wonderful.
Crappy weather too, in Kansas City, MO, but we're north of the freeze line. It has has been putting out either pellets or flakes all day. Yesterday it went from 60 degrees in the morning to less than 20 by sundown. One of the few days I'm glad I am still unemployed and don't HAVE to go outside except to get the mail.
The occurrence in Holland's Livy, 1600, of CORNMUDGIN (q.v.) has led to a suggestion that this was the original form, with the meaning 'concealer or hoarder of corn', mudgin being associated with ME. much-en, mich-en to pilfer, steal, or muchier, Norman form of OF. mucier, musser to conceal, hide away. But examination of the evidence shows that curmudgeon was in use a quarter of a century before Holland's date, and that cornmudgin is apparently merely a nonce-word of Holland's, a play upon corn and curmudgeon. The suggestion that the first syllable is cur, the dog, is perhaps worthy of note; but that of Dr. Johnson's 'unknown correspondent', cœur méchant for F. méchant cœur, 'evil or malicious heart', is noticeable only as an ingenious specimen of pre-scientific 'etymology', and as having been retailed by Ash in the form, 'from the French cœur unknown, and mechant a correspondent'!
The OED.
Maybe you are the CORNMUDGIN!
92: he's certainly got an ear for it.
I thought of you when I read this, fishbasket:
I saw no dormice. Very few people ever see dormice, even when there is a thriving population. Dormice are tinier than you would believe possible—you could hodl a family in one cupped hand, if they would only stay still—they are nocturnal, they sleep seven months of the year, and they live mostly above our heads in the high branches of hazels.
You might ask, then, what is the point of bringing them back. One answer is that even while living invisible lives, they are giving pleasure to humans. There is pleasure to be had in knowing that dormice are out there, living their busy, hungry, sleep-filled, furry lives; mothers leading a little funny train of babies through the canopy. There is pleasure, too, in being in a place where dormice are: knowing that somewhere above your head, dormice sleep and feed on insects and hazel nuts. The wood feels like a better place for the knowledge that there are dormice in it.
The author? Ogged.
Good evening! After a brisk walk from home to work and then, later, from work to co-op to home, I'm feeling invigorated! It's about sixty degrees indoors! And of course below zero outside!
I was neither hard core enough to go to the support-the-RNC-Eight demonstration (although fortuitously I got done with work too late to really attend) nor hard core enough to ride my bike. But as soon as I can rustle up my sewing kit I'm going to make my long-talked-of DIY half-balaclava so that I can bike to work once the highs get back up around ten degrees.
Actually, I'm feeling horribly cold and ill-tempered and I spent my spare time today reading Iain Banks's Complicity, which rather makes you think that the whole human race might as well just freeze to death and be done with it. I've been trying to focus on warmth and light but I keep hanging around the goddamn anarchists all the goddamn time and they're no fun. "No peace! Fight like Greece!", my eye.
Say, that's a thought--what's a nice, cheering yet left-leaning novel I could read this week? Something at least a rung or two about JB Priestley, for preference.
There is pleasure to be had in knowing that dormice are out there, and to knowing that Ogged is living his busy, hungry, sleep-filled, furry life.
God, I do not miss snow, but for some reason my sicko kid does.
Of course your son misses the snow! He never had to jumpstart a car in the middle of the night in the middle of January, when the wind was so bittercold you thought it might cut right through you.
But c'mon, B, you were in the tropics of Canada. You were way south. (Well, way south within Canada, admittedly, but still...).
98: I was, and it was cold as shit. I believe there's a reason why msot Canadians live within a couple hundred miles of the southern border, and it isn't just because you all love America so much.
Current temperatures as of weather.com:
Ulan Bator 3°F (-17°F windchill)
Winnipeg -17°F (-36°F windchill)
Anadyr', Chukotka 21°F (0°F windchill) (winds 43 mph)
Noril'sk -27°F (-45°F windchill)
Omsk -2°F (-11°F windchill) (winds 4 mph)
Yakutsk -53°F (windchill N/A)
Of course it's late morning in most of Russia, and night in Winnipeg.
Chukotka is not cold at all!
Yeah, I remember that usually fucking Moscow was warmer than where I lived. Tropics my frigid ass.
102: Bah, B. Outside of lotusland, where you were was pretty much as temperate as Canada gets. Short winter, too.
When I was in college Cornell had a website with updates from the Mars Lander, including temperature information. There was one point, admittedly when it was night in Ithaca but midday where the lander was, when the lander's recorded temperature was higher than the recorded temperature in Ithaca. Ithaca: colder than Mars.
Note that Ithaca is also south of, and warmer than, almost all of Canada.
I refuse to note that. Absolutely refuse.
106: ben w-lfs-n: colder than Mars; colder than Ithaca.
There's just no helping some people.
Minneapolis is north of Toronto but not Montreal, much less Vancouver. Minneapolis's were the farthest north World Series.
B. is a delicate tropical princess.
I endorse W-lfs-n's refusal to note.
107: Is he also willing to sacrifice your love?
Ithaca slightly colder than Toronto (being right on the lake moderates the temps there a bit) and Halifax and of course warmer (in winter) than Vancouver. So it does OK by Canadian standards, probably at ~25th percentile in terms of winter coldness by population.
colder than Mars
i recalled this
улирал нь үгүй хотхонд төржÑ?Ñ?, би
Ñ?алхи нь үгүй гүвÑ?Ñ?н дунд Ó©Ñ?чÑ?Ñ?, би
Ñ…Ò¯Ñ?Ñ?л мөрөөдөл үл нахиалуулÑ?ан гÑ?Ñ€Ñ?Ñ?Ñ?Ñ?Ñ?н одовой
хүнийг хайрлахыг үл мÑ?дÑ?Ñ… нÑ?гÑ?нтÑ?й учирмой...
[i] was born to the town without seasons
to the hills without the wind
[i] will leave home without dreams
to meet someone who won't love back
the last lines are pretty optimistic though, about change
i like her translation very much, the original says 'someone without love' 'ai no nai hito' as if it's just objectively that, the person he'll meet don't know the feeling, she says 'who don't know how to love', also like regardless who is the other person
my version says what it says
it's like not lost in translation, but like added
her is my friend, found that at her blog
Ithaca slightly colder than Toronto (being right on the lake moderates the temps there a bit) and Halifax and of course warmer (in winter) than Vancouver.
Yeah, Ithaca's position inland means it's generally colder and drier than the cities right on the lakes, which can be seen in the maps in 77. It doesn't get the real lake effect snow, though there is an occasional similar but much smaller effect driven by the Finger Lakes, but it gets very, very cold.
Ithaca warmer in winter than Vancouver? I would have assumed the opposite.
Normal winter days here, we might have a forecast like "showers in the morning, with periods of rain in the afternoon leading to rain or mist in the evening." "Same as yesterday" would also work.
Portland would be a wonderful place for a very disciplined self-employed person whose job wasn't time sensitive. If you worked on all the nasty days and played on all the nice days, you'd easily get a normal 240 days of work in a year.
But you'd occasionally ending up working 20 days straight.
116: oops, yeah I said that the wrong way around. meant "of course colder (in winter) than Vancouver".
72: That's mighty nice of the po-lice.
Heh. He wasn't a bad guy. He was flailing and stomping and jumping around a lot, but didn't actually try to hit us. Probably just off his meds.
117: Summers off, basically.
I've become one of those Westerners I used to scoff at back in VT. It's in the 20s, and I'm thinking that it's unpleasantly cold. Still wearing shorts, though.
The twenties is unpleasantly cold.
You're also one of those Westerners I used to scoff at, ben. And that was before I even knew who you were.
For all the winter gloominess in coastal Washington (save Port Townsend and vicinity in the interesting little rainshadow of the Olympics) and Oregon it is worse by almost every measure when you get to coastal southeast Alaska (colder, cloudier, more hours and days with measurable precipitation).
Actually, the only good months in Portland are Sept. and Oct. August is too hot, and even June and July can be chilly and cloudy.
You can pretend that it's not unpleasant, and you can even get used to it, but it's still unpleasant.
Yes, right, bracing. I acknowledge that. But you can't be braced continually for the whole winter. Can't be done. Just won't work.
You know what's unpleasant? 39 below (straight up, no wind chill factor). More unpleasant? Having to use an outhouse when it's 39 below, because the stupid cabin where you're staying doesn't have even a pit-toilet bathroom. Even more unpleasant? Having to take a crap in said outhouse. Yet more unpleasant? Having a union suit on at the time.
128: I may have the image, forevermore, of JMcQ commenting in that style of dress.
Yes, that does sound unpleasant. But also, 20 degrees is unpleasant. Less so, but still unpleasant.
20 degrees is warm, if the sun's out and there's no wind.
What's unpleasant is 33 degrees, any amount of wind, and any amount of rain. That's infinitely worse than a windless 20 degrees.
And the turd gets frozen in your butt and you have to go to the ER. And the ER doctor is -- YOUR OWN MOTHER!
THAT'S unpleasant!
Secretary of the Interior named
WHAT SHOULD WE THINK, RHUBARB PIE?
129: The one garment that could have made that situation worse? A slanket. Because then I would have felt like an idiot.
Jesus, way to many otherwise sane people are acting upset about the heinous shoe-throwing incident. My ex-girlfriend Rachel Maddow, for example. *Sob*
People who choose to live with winter are forever trying to convince others that the choice is morally elevating, in the line of a duty. They're like people stuck in an abusive marriage, trying to justify it to themselves.
It's not true! You can be free!
Was your union suit fastened in the back with two comically oversized buttons, one of which constantly came loose, and was it scratchy?
nis sounds very excited
well, oyasuminasai minna
Just as Chris Matthews would do much less harm as an unsuccessful PA. primary candidate than he does at MSNBC, so will Salazar do less harm at Interior than he would in the Senate. We need to think in terms of the big picture.
Winter is a test of your inner powers. If your powers are right, you like winter.
127: But you can't be braced continually for the whole winter. Can't be done. Just won't work.
Sure you can! You get some nice two-by-fours and feeding tube and a colostomy bag and nail your ass up. Gotta watch out for chafing tho.
My ex-girlfriend Rachel Maddow, for example. *Sob*
Speaking of which, not only should people be allowed to throw shoes at the President, because he's not fucking royalty, but also, when is the big push for marriage equality going to occur? I meant the right of heterosexual men to gaymarry TV lesbians?
Obama's choices are very Democratic-establishment-y.
max
[''bout the outcome if any Democrat won.']
I know that this will be hard on Rachel, but I really can't forgive this. I wonder if Scarlett is still pining for me.
A key point about cold weather is that you should keep the inside of your house warmer than the outside -- an insulated house is a good idea. Second, wear warm clothes.
Us veterans know this shit. Taking hot baths helps too.
137: It wasn't scratchy, but and it also didn't have the flap of comics fame, which I think I'd have preferred. It was basically like a long fly, and it would have been more comfortable just to take the whole damn thing off, utterly defeating the purpose.
As excretory experiences go (egestive experiences, if you want to be accurate, though I suppose I probably peed as well), it was pretty unpleasant, and yet. It was in about as quiet a place as I've ever been, and there was no wind, so in the cold, sound carried far and with crystalline clarity. Tree limbs were cracking (from the sap freezing, or so I was told) with the sound of rifle shots; one cracked loudly just above the outhouse, and fragments of ice rained down on the roof with a delicate tinkling, as though someone had shot a Christmas tree ornament.
Salazar seems like a decent choice for Interior. He's pretty conservative for a Democratic Senator, but as far as I know his record on environmental issues is quite good. I don't know all that much about him, though.
there was no wind, so in the cold, sound carried far and with crystalline clarity. Tree limbs were cracking (from the sap freezing, or so I was told) with the sound of rifle shots; one cracked loudly just above the outhouse, and fragments of ice rained down on the roof with a delicate tinkling, as though someone had shot a Christmas tree ornament.
That's very nice and all, but I think you owe us a poetic description of the gentle "plop" you yourself effected.
145: It is probably a good political choice as I think the Dept. of Interior/environmental stuff is important in the newly emerging Democratic interior West, but it takes a somewhat different form than bi-coastal environmentalism. Presumably, Salazar has a good sense of that.
146: It probably froze on the way down. I recall (I think) from "To Build a Fire" that spit supposedly crackles on the snow at -60.
146: Funny you should mention that, because the ice and everything is such a vivid aural memory, but I don't recall the other thing. Suppressed, I guess. I've leave it to your imagination.
147: Yeah, and Secretary of the Interior is one of the more bureaucratic and less political cabinet-level positions anyway. The subordinate agency heads have a lot of autonomy, and most of the major policy decisions are made by Congress. Given that, Salazar's a pretty good choice. He used to head the Colorado Department of Natural Resources, so he presumably knows the bureaucratic side pretty well.
"The other thing". Very discreet.
Not trying to be discreet, ben. Everybody poops.
It's what everybody does that people mostly try to be discreet about.
I bought my parents slankets for Christmas because when I was telling my mum about them ("Blankets! With sleeves! LOL!") she got all excited and said that sounded fantastic.
Weatherwise it's misty here this morning, but dry. Didn't get light until after 7.30am - roll on the solstice.
doesn't, this verb requirement to change with the singularity of the noun is the difficultest thing to remember
coz our verbs don't change, only tenses, very convenient
It's been colder than usual here recently, with regular frost in coastal areas that normally don't see much of it. Not really any snow yet, though. Back now to the usual rain etc. People who have grown up in places with colder winters (e.g. Sweden, Montana) have told me that they find they feel cold here in winter because of the dampness.
it's the rainy season here (which isn't really all that rainy compared to more properly monsoon-like places). so it was 90 and rainy/cloudy today, and is now maybe 78, damp, and nice.
I hadn't heard the word 'slanket' before, and without context I would've thought it was a term for a sort of woman that I should very much like to meet.
I miss fall a lot, and crisp coolness, and dark blue skies, and woodsmoke, but I don't exactly miss winter. I would certainly never want to live in someplace like where minneapollitan, frowner et al are, or canada--except maybe vancouver? prolonged periods of vicious coldness would bum me out, plus I'd die of consumption. I don't even think I have the fortitude to live in portland; my husband thinks I would be too depressed. I'm ok with nyc, that's about as far as I'll go. my willingness to be outside in the cold in ny when I lived there was bolstered by the banked fires of chemical heat in my body, I'm not sure how I'd like it now.
hi neil! I heard your holiday party was fun.
I hadn't heard the word 'slanket' before, and without context I would've thought it was a term for a sort of woman that I should very much like to meet.
There's something clever to be done with slanket, strumpet, crumpet, and teapot here, but I don't know what it is.
'Slinky' and 'skank' also seem to play into it.
I was so tempted to buy Slinky Dog when I came across it recently.
154: Everybody poops, just in the wrong places.
Hi Alameida! It sure was fun. People videotaped the new faculty drunkenly singing patriotic songs, and then students and staff decorated my colleague's face with permanent marker the day before his plane flight.
168: Ah, undergraduates. Tell your colleague rubbing alcohol (or grain alcohol if it's handy) should help. Help get rid of the marker, that is, though drinking it could help, too.
so did Austin get any freezing rain?
A slanket could be some sort of chimera from myth and legend -- the head of a slut, the body of a skank, and the hindquarters of a strumpet. Amongst one another the swains would tell tales, more fiction than fact, about where and how such wonderful creatures could be found.
with permanent marker
oil will solve the ink i guess or ethanol, but that was pretty mean
but maybe your colleague enjoyed it, no? as if it was a sign of acceptance, coz people play mean jokes only to the near and dear people, friends who can tolerate it
i recalled a classmate whose friends put drunk him into the dumpster, he tolerated it well, but seemed to lost their respect, some things can't never be tolerated well
I hadn't heard the word 'slanket' before, and without context I would've thought it was a term for a sort of woman that I should very much like to meet.
tell tales, more fiction than fact, about where and how such wonderful creatures could be found.
The only common feature of these tales is their insistence that the slanket can be found by listening for the sound of an old song...
A tisket, a tasket, a green and yellow basket..."
There's something clever to be done with slanket, strumpet, crumpet, and teapot here, but I don't know what it is.
Gather all four together and experiment.
170: No. It's damn cold (about 32) and there's been some on-and-off drizzling, but the predictions turned out to be a bit overdone. I doubt heebie's neck of the woods is much different.
168: Yeah, I offered him my vodka for that purpose, but for some reason he turned me down and ended up going on the plane with stars on his forehead and the remnants of a big handlebar mustache.
Er, that was for Sir Kraab at 169. Anyway, read, I sort of think he had fit himself into a place respectwise that could happily deal with having his face drawn on.
Apo, I think we think alike surprisingly often. Are you sure you're not a werewolf? Or maybe I'm a wereapostropher.
we think alike surprisingly often
Maybe it's a North Carolina thing.
178: huh, that's a lot more adorable than the dick-pointing-at-mouth and "FUCK" in mirror writing genre of sharpie face painting I'm used to.
Are you back at ABQ or Santa Fe or still out at Chaco?
182: No sense of subtlety, there.
186: okay, that was just kind of pedestrian (sure, the mashmallows are a nice touch) until I saw his neck.
182: This is Singapore, so it's possible that people were trying to avoid being caned for vandalizing a faculty member.
Neil:
I just found out that one of my college housemates is working in Singapore for microsoft. So if you meant a large American from Northern Virginia who is fond of wearing an Ascot, please give him my regards.
It's starting to clear up a bit, but there are still dark clouds on the southern horizon and there's another system over central Arizona right now that's projected to hit us tomorrow evening.
that was just kind of pedestrian
I prefer "art brut".
a large American from Northern Virginia who is fond of wearing an Ascot tell him he's making us all look bad and to please stop.
fond of wearing an Ascot
Does he drive around in a hippie van solving mysteries?
195 made me laugh out loud. In public, even.
Does he drive around in a hippie van solving mysteries?
I'm more concerned that he might be driving his 6'4" 250 pound self around on a little scooter while wearing the ascot.
If Neil can get me a picture of that, I would be forever grateful.
Heh. I was SO ANXIOUS for the Interior Secretary to be named, and then they did, and I was all, "Oh. I don't know anything about him so that tells me nothing." I will shift my burning desire! Now I MUST KNOW who will be named the head of Reclamation.
Also, 136 is exactly right. Winter fucking sucks and I hate it every time and I'm constantly surprised to find out I can hate it even more. The things people pretend redeem winter are just rationalizing and self-delusion, because winter objectively sucks donkeycock. I want spring and summer and some of fall all year round and no I would not get tired of it and no I wouldn't miss seasons and yes that would make my life much better. Because the worst day of summer, in 115 degree weather, is still better than this 40 degree bullshit cold I'm enduring.
I hate winter. I hate having to provide my own energy and happiness when those should just constantly flow into me with the sunlight and high blue sky. I fucking hate it.
(Yeah, whatever. I intellectually understand that we need rainstorms. Emotionally? Fuck those too.)
Reading up on Maynard G. Krebs (played by Bob Denver on the Dobie Gillis TV show in the late '50s/early '60s) the other day and came across this bit of trvia that I had not been aware of: Scooby writer Mark Evanier noted that "Fred was based on Dobie, Shaggy on Maynard, Velma on Zelda and Daphne on Thalia."
40 degree bullshit cold
Californians are pussies.
Megan speaks the truth.
More reasons to hate on winter:
1) it's totally colorless and gray and sad.
2) During the summer everyone slows down, which makes it feel like one big community, but in the winter everyone scurries from place to place, all hunkered down, and it's very impersonal.
3) I hate Michigan.
At least I hate Michigan winters.
202: pff. Everybody knows Scooby was based on UMass Amherst, Fred on Amherst, Shaggy on Hampshire, Velma on Smith, and Daphne on Mt. Holyoke.
It's much easier to warm up on a cold day than cool down on a hot one. (You can always put on another layer, whereas there are only so many clothes you can take off.) Plus snow is objectively awesome. As are warm things in wintertime: fires, hot chocolate, slankets, etc.
The lack of sunlight is a problem, granted, but it's not one about which Californians have any real standing to complain.
Seriously, though, 40 degrees isn't cold. I don't care if you grew up in California; it just isn't.
206: don't you live in Texas? Do people really "hunker down" in winter there?
It's much easier to warm up on a cold day than cool down on a hot one.
This is not true; people just don't realize how easy it is to keep a cup of ice around. You can go without ac in Texas just fine if you are happy to keep a cup of ice around.
212 to 210.
But seriously, cold is negatives assuming F degrees.
The lack of light bothers me more than the cold.
211: That's why I live in Texas. (Or its weather-equivalent.)
210: Seriously. I set my AC lower than 40 degrees.
Seriously, though, 40 degrees isn't cold.
It really isn't. Plus, all the bugs are gone and you don't have to mow the lawn. On the other hand, I start complaining as soon as the thermometer gets above 80°. I hate summer every bit as much as Megan hates winter.
I'm not some apologist for winter, here. Sure, when it's freezing rain and 28 degrees, that sucks. Sure, when it's late March and you're fucking tired of the winter, that sucks. Sure, Michigan sucks. But the snow days when you're a kid, or walking around right after it snows, or cold bright winter days, or it being cold enough for a genuinely useful fireplace: that those things do nothing to mitigate the crappy is pure fallacy.
The lack of light bothers me more than the cold.
Do you mean the short days, or no sunlight? The latter really is variable by location, lots of places get tons of big bright sky in winter. Cold and cloudless. Other spots (e.g. pac north west) are all gray skies and overcast, drizzly days. World of difference between them.
Summer is terrible. It is terrible and it lasts for fucking ever and there's nowhere to escape it whereas coats and scarves and gloves are snug and warm and fun to use as accessories.
Seriously. I set my AC lower than 40 degrees.
Planet murderer.
221 is exactly right, too.
Long crappy hot stretches in summer are much worse than long crappy cold stretches in winter.
Short days kind of bother me. But if I have plenty of interesting things to do in well-lit indoor kinds of places, I don't really notice that much.
219: Shorter Tweety:
Raindrops Snowflakes on roses and whiskers on kittens
Bright copper kettles and warm woolen mittens
Brown paper packages tied up with strings
These are a few of my favorite things
201: Rainstorms, proper ones, with howling wind and lightning and thunder that so loud you think you've died, those are the best thing ever. I'd trade a half dozen sunny afternoons for a half hour of really violent thunder and lightning with the giant hailstones. As long as I'm under cover, that is.
Do you mean the short days, or no sunlight?
Both. Gray drizzly days bother me more in the winter, and shiv has noticed that I am a billion times more pleasant to be around if there is sunshine and I have had a chance to go out in it. (And why I like northern Canada in the summer. I'm like a solar cell charging up on all the sunshine.)
Back to the heavy snow. I love winter.
226: Giant hailstones:
Five German glider pilots made the mistake of flying into a thunderstorm over the Rhone Mountains in 1930. Fearing their fragile craft might break up, they bailed out. They all essentially became human hailstones encased in ice. All but one froze to death.
227: Yeah, but my point was more that some places, winter mostly means short, dry, colder days but with tons of sunshine. Which is fine to get out in, much less problematic than damp cold days as far as being comfortable goes. So I was wondering if you were ok with that, is all.
Hailstones are no fun to be out it.
Crazy rainstorms though? Excellent fun.
230: I think the lack of light bothers me more than the shorter days. Brilliant sunny winter days are great. But as I hail from the dreariest place outside of Seattle.... you'd think I'd be used to overcast skies.
I love winter! It is so cold (okay, 50 degrees, but still) outside and warm and snuggly inside. Yesterday I made gingerbread and today I am eating it with whipped cream and hot coffee. It rained very hard yesterday and today the sky is brilliant and blue and the air is so clean!
Hooray for winter!
Here's a response to a query I made about whether Swedish winter depression is matched by summer happiness:
John Emerson; yes, it SURE is! Having 22 years of experience....we tank up the joie de vivre in the never-ending summer days, suck every bit of blood out of it, otherwise we would be totally drained out by sometime in February. Now we are only a bit ( sometimes very) depressed, but we never fail hoping for the fertility to come back sometime. I am just officially experiencing my spring fever, it's in every part of the body, it bursts! :D I was total cynical last month, although I didn´t know why, and now I´m just all filled with Love and Lust and Longing! Really, physically, and it´s really intense! It´s a great and exciting transformation, and it happens every year in late April-June. I´m sorry about the flummigness of this post but I´m just not as good at English as I would wish, but this is a true thing in our mentality, just as most of us get really depressed at least sometime during the winter months. That makes us really melancholic and season-oriented. Some people note that Swedes seem cold but we are just really longing for the summer, and we have big trembling hearts inside. :)
Research established that flumming is "what Swedish hippies do".
Anyway, having contrasting seasons punctuates your year and gives you different things to do during different times of the year. There are lots of things to do during super-cold winters. It's true that they all have some aspect of "meeting a challenge", but a large number of voluntary activities have that (e.g., most sports).
I also think that at if you spend time in cold weather, at a certain point your body develops response skills. It's like it learns to push back. It feels good.
I missed thunderstorms when I lived in SF.
Where the fuck do you get your thunderstorms these days, Sifu? Because there sure as hell aren't any in Boston.
238: not at this exact moment there aren't. There were some over the past year or so, though. They literally never happen in SF.
Southern California can have some epic thunderstorms, actually.
According to Mike Davis, LA has tornadoes, but the media cover it up by calling them something else.
SF pretty much specializes in fog. Does a good job of that, though.
You get some pretty impressive winter storms off the pacific, too. I didn't live in SF area long enough to see if they can be as fun there as up north on the coast, but I"m guessing not, california beaches aren't built right for that I suspect.
241: I think the issue is more that they're pretty rare.
I've lived here since July 1, 2002, and haven't experienced even one respectable thunderstorm in that time. Sure, it sometimes rains, and the sky makes little whimpery thunder-like sounds, but nothing that ever really kicks your ass like a proper storm. I want the sky to light up like a goddamn fireworks display and my whole fucking house to rattle with every boom.
Hm. There have definitely been proper storms when I've been in Boston. There was also that tropical storm, but that was probably wussy up here. It was wussy, but pretty fun, down near the cape.
According to Davis, they're fairly frequent (semiannual or thereabouts). Don't have the book here. They're called "violent summer storms" or something.
Thunderstorm frequency map - USA.
Lightning strike frequency map - USA.
246: I dunno, it's possible. They issued honest-to-goodness tornado warnings this summer, so it didn't seem to be covered up then. Also, given the local news media in LA, the idea that they would shy away from the most sensationalistic possible angle on any given weather event is rather difficult to believe.
244: You really need a prarie or the like for a proper thunder & sheet lightning storm, I suspect. You can get as violent storms off a coast, but the lightning is different.
247: so we're both right? Well that's no help.
247: That's pretty cool. How is it possible that there are thunderstorms without lightning strikes? I thought thunder was the sound that lightning makes.
The think I always loved about pacific storms is they'd get about as violent as they could be and still not threaten life and limb too much. Tornadoes are localized horrible + nothing much anywhere else, hurricanes are either pretty boring or bloody terrifying it seems. You could have a good winter storm on the coast and go running around in it. The lightning wasn't likely going to kill you. You could lean over and let the wind hold you up, but it wasn't going to pick up your roof.
good times.
251: Sometimes it's cloud to cloud, not cloud to ground.
252: that's about what hurricanes in New England are like. Nor'easters, too, really.
Riding a bicycle in a blizzard is always a good time.
Note LA Basin is a bit higher than the rest of California. The ones they do have tend to be worthless and weak. The Salt Lake City one not too long back was a real anomaly.
What these maps are telling me is mostly not to live in Florida.
And don't live there in a mobile home when you don't.
255: Yet another reason not to live in Oklahoma
What these maps are telling me is mostly not to live in Florida.
You need this map to tell you that?
I assume that people in other places have internal resources that they fall back on when the sun isn't shining. I've never had to develop those, so I don't and I crater immediately.
I was asking Margie whether we suffer so much in winter because we don't take it seriously. Like, if we had real winters, we would dress appropriately and turn on the heat and do some faux-satisfying winter thing. But we don't take it seriously, because how could nature ever be anything other than seventy degrees and sunny, so we're always freezing and disappointed.
Margie, from a cold climate with snow winters, says no. She says you dress warmer and you try to do things, but it is also colder and wetter out, so the suffering ends up at about the same level. And, you are cooped up indoors for days with the kids bouncing off the walls.
we would dress appropriately and turn on the heat and do some faux-satisfying winter thing.
No, you would dress appropriately and go outside and do freaking awesome winter things. No faux about it.
If Margie came from wet (which pretty much equals not really cold) winter area, that's harder, true.
I also find the Bay Area to be too cold. On fifty-sixty degree days in the Bay Area I'll have shivers (but, of course, not add layers of clothes) and wonder if I will ever feel warm again. It is the thin light and that crucial ten degrees. Then I go back to Sacramento and the suffering ends.
Solar insolation map - US in January.
internal resources that they fall back on when the sun isn't shining
Light bulbs, mostly. Not recommended for internal use, though.
On fifty-sixty degree days in the Bay Area I'll have shivers
Good lord, Megan. You're broken.
In a real winter it's not wet at all. It's so dry that your nose bleeds. 33 F weather is the worst possible weather.
33 F weather is the worst possible weather
Worst possible? Surely not.
Not really shivers. I meant goosebumps.
My best friend from childhood is a high school teacher in Minneapolis now. He says the coldest day he's personally witnessed (-40), he threw scalding water from the stove into the air, and nothing would hit the ground. It would turn into something like powdered sugar, then disappear altogether.
Also, further evidence that Californians don't understand winter.
Like so.
I hope I never understand winter.
(Also, Apo, I wondered whether you had seen the bacon bikini.)
In the Bay Area, it is chilly and wet and houses have no insulation and inadequate heaters. I would rather have a 27-degree day here than a 40-degree day there. However, bad things happen under about 17 degrees F and then more bad things happen under 0.
270: It must have been colder than forty below, or else the stove was pretty far above the ground, because as even a chechaquo knows,
spittle cracks on the snow at fifty below.
272 - More evidence that we suffer more because we don't take winter seriously.
What I really hate about winter:
(a) Days where the weather is in any of the bad-things ranges.
(b) When the snow gets old and dirty and ugly, then more snow falls on top of it.
(c) The asshole, asshole, asshole, cockfaced motherfucker residents of my city who don't even try to shovel their walks, leaving those of us who walk to first have to plunge through many inches of fresh snow and then to skitter and stumble over trodden-down, iced-over old snow, for weeks.
(d) When it doesn't end at the end of February.
I remember 275c being a major problem in Ithaca, particularly with the sidewalks in front of certain frathouses.
(e) When wild wolves invade the city and devour whole wedding parties.
Ithaca gets less snow, of course, but that advantage was easily counteracted by the quick icing-over of what snow we did have, plus the steepness of many of the streets.
More evidence that we suffer more because we don't take winter seriously.
The flipside of this problem: A friend of mine moved north from Houston and found summer to be harder to deal with because fewer houses and shops had air conditioning.
more bad things happen under 0.
This is just wrong though. Very roughly -15 to 15 is lovely. Much colder gets uncomfortable, much warmer is to0 wet (15 is actually to high. Say 10 then and break the symmetry). You can run around outdoors all day in -15 with reasonable clothes, you aren't going to get frostbite and you don't have to bundle up insanely.
Still a weather thread?
Dallas:Currently 30 degrees, been 26-30 all day. Yahoo/TWC forecast:31/31
Was just saying Dallas is sooo interesting. Most of our weather is determined by the winds. We get the high dry cool mountain air or the damp humid warm winds off the coast. "31/31" means it's overcast with winds off the Gulf. Yup, SSE.
When & where the two winds/fronts meet sometimes we get a "dry line", a 10-50 mile wide line of thunderstorms & tornados.
Summer in Houston sucks for much the same reason that winter in the Bay area does: humidity.
This is just wrong though. Very roughly -15 to 15 is lovely. Much colder gets uncomfortable, much warmer is to0 wet (15 is actually to high. Say 10 then and break the symmetry). You can run around outdoors all day in -15 with reasonable clothes, you aren't going to get frostbite and you don't have to bundle up insanely.
I think you must run hotter internally than I do, or maybe you live in a land with no wind.
I think you must run hotter internally than I do
This has been commented on enough times (and enough `you don't mind warming me up, right?' ) that I have to admit it's a possibility.
For whatever reason, I seem to manage temperature shifts over a large range fairly well.
I remember 275c being a major problem in Ithaca fortunately, 275K is just fine.
Standpipe quit posting at Standpipe's blog, see.
Much to my amusement, a "Snuggie" commercial came on a minute ago. Rory: "Why don't you just wear a robe or a sweater?"
||
Weather! Day 5 without power for my mom up in New Hampshire. Drat. I've put a couple of pictures of the stoopid pellet stove which does not currently work, and the lake at the side of which she resides up there, on the Flickr group.
Needless to say, the snuggly warm is what it's all about, when you're not hiking across the frozen lake (danger, exciting, fun, deeply quiet out there).
|>
Is she doing okay? Still not going to break down and go to your uncle's?
293: No way is she going to break down, etc. Mostly just going out of her mind with boredom, I think. Countdown to having the power back in 1, 2 days, probably. Hasn't had a shower since last Thursday! Washed her hair in the sink with bottled water, a cold proposition. And so on. Everybody's calling and checking in on her once or twice a day; it's all cool, just tedious.
My brother relates that there are reports of looting in his area of central Mass., where power was just restored this afternoon.
We saw our first Snuggie/Slanket ad last night. I commented that it would be a great way to look like a cultist extra from a '70s sci-fi movie. If our house were redone in a wall-to-wall Omega Man theme I'm afraid I'd be forced to get a couple of them.
295: you know, I have a friend who's house is exactingly decorated in mid century bachelor/comic book supervillain style; I should recommend he get one. Do they come in shimmery silver?
The extra large Snuggie, or Shoggoth, is the worst seller, so far.
296: Those mylar space blankets are cheap and readily available -- you could tailor him up a couple.
298: it's a little hard to imagine them being comfortable for home lounging and/or gliding silently a foot above the floor. Besides, that'd be gay.
Do they come in shimmery silver?
I've never gotten one that excited. They come in blue, "teal" and red. The "teal" looks - on the TV, anyway - to be more of a silvery/white/mint kind of color, so, almost?
Does your friend need more friends? I would gladly volunteer. I can even spell "whose" and have little-bitchery on tap.
You'd have to adapt the pattern to make it out of mylar, of course, but it looks perfectly practical.. Come to think of it, Sifu, what does a Killer Robot wear when it gets chilly?
I can even spell "whose"
Once, I was like you.
what does a Killer Robot wear when it gets chilly?
The still warm corpse of its target, I assume. With sleeve holes cut in it.
304: New meaning to the "engineer's raincoat."
302: But is there a thunderstorm?
