"An INCH of snow! We're all gonna DIE!"

[PCIntern]

Those of us who reside in the Delaware Valley around The City of Brotherly Love, are often treated to the impending storm (und drang) watch of the local TV stations, sponsored no doubt, by the supermarket chains. This week we had deadly forecasts of 'precipitation' of unknown variety. But the Temperatures were never forecast to go below 35 degrees, so, as they say...WTF?

what did they think was going to fall from the clouds...locusts? Murrain? Rats? I mean really...

See, back in 1978 and 1979, we were hit with large storms which were not predicted well in advance and the region was paralyzed. Fortunately for them, the media realized what a gold mine this stuff is and every storm becomes a 'what-if' scenario.

Here's the best part: a full 12 minutes of the 30 minute local news last night was about a light rainstorm which was 'just ending as of the beginning of the broadcast." They had reporters everywhere showing wet streets and windshield wipers thrumming away. Stunning news coverage.

[Wcross]

1. Do you have all your affairs in order?

Will, burial instructions ect? Now would be a good time to get that in order before you sucumb to the blizzard.

[Ilsa]

3. They won't be able to bury the bodies! The earth will be frozen three

miles down and will never thaw. They'll have to have mass body burnings. Sorry PCIntern. Looks like you'll miss Christmas this year.

[momster]

27. That'll Keep Every Body Warm

"Come to the Body Burning! Bring the kiddies!"

Sorry...I live in D.C. where when two snowflakes hold hands, the whole city shuts down. We had about a quarter inch fall last week...with a bit of ice...and you would have thought it was the Day After Tomorrow with glaciers sailing down Pennsylvania Ave.

[Ilsa]

2. Stepheanie Miller was saying earlier on her show that Pat Robertson

was digging in on the severity of the weather. HE was commenting that it must be a warning because of the US's "attitude toward Israel."

Terra from the skies!

[Lurking Dem]

4. lol

Here in the midsouth they predict a snow or ice event and everyone runs to the store and stocks up like their $35,000 SUV would never make it through the 1/4" dusting.

The forecast will call for above freezing temperatures the next few days so it only lasts for a very brief time, but they have purchased every loaf of bread and jug of milk in town.

A few days later it will happen again and they are back at the store.

Where the hell is the 3 weeks worth of crap they bought less than a week ago?

It's one of the great curiosities. Like the loan sneaker in the middle of the road.

[spinbaby]

6. In Pittsburgh they buy toilet paper

I don't know why every snow requires stocking up on at least a month's worth of toilet paper.

And why would I want to borrow a sneaker in the middle of the road?

[Lurking Dem]

13. Bwa!

I'm on my first cuppa coffee. Cut me some slack.

[RaleighNCDUer]

19. You obviously don't remember the Great Toilet Paper Crisis of 1979 -

never want to go through that again.

[MiniMe]

31. Bread, Milk, and toilet paper...the 3 staples you need for a storm

Plus the alcoholic beverage of your choice.

[AlGore-08.com]

24. I grew up in northern MN, where blizzards could strand you for 3 - 5 days, & could hit from Oct-Apr

In the early part of the winter, the TV and radio stations would issue the blizzard warnings, and nobody would pay attention. But after the first real blizzard hit - -and everybody spent a couple days inside wondering when the food would run out - - any subsequent blizzard warnings would get everybody in the county down to a grocery store, buying out the supplies. When I was old enough to drive, I started using the number of cars in grocery store parking lots as guides to whether I needed to get home NOW or whether I could finish whatever I was doing outside the house.

Because of this, I tend to think going to the supermarket and stocking up on bread when there's a major storm coming is a good idea.

[seabeyond]

5. beginning of week suppose to be huge ass ice storm.... it rained

but, days of we are all gona diiiiie. i hear ya

on edit: kids so sure they were gonna miss school with all the hype. learing to suck in their dissappointments, and NOT believe the predictions

[rockymountaindem]

7. They do that everywhere

Even in Colorado...

[BleedingHeartPatriot]

39. Argh, I know it, it's crazy.

We are a mile above sea level, we get snow, it's a known fact.

Now, the true blizzards are one thing about which it's important to know, but these wimpy little snow storms are hardly worthy of the breathless coverage they receive.

I remember coworkers who moved here from CA really believing the "360 days a year of sunshine" PR. LOL, little did they know, even 12 minutes of sunlight on a 10 degree day counts as a "sunshine day",

MKJ

[rurallib]

8. I was in Philly on business about 20 years ago

There was an impending storm that week. When the day of the storm finally came everything shut down, schools, factories etc. It never snowed, barely rained. But everything closed on the possibility of snow.

[Kajsa]

9. Here in SoCal the local news stations refer to

EVERY rainfront as a "storm"!

Kid you not- we get 1/4 of an inch of rain
and these dudes are on "STORM TRACK!"

Granted, we have gone through a two year drought
down here, but we are starting to get a little bit
of rain- Yay!

But " storm track"?

I don't think so!

[ProfessorGAC]

10. Happens Here In Chicago

Hey folks! Newsflash: IT SNOWS IN CHICAGO IN THE WINTER TIME!

Probably the only town that doesn't do this is Buffalo. Those folks are so used to it the news probably doesn't bother mentioning it.
The Professor

[RaleighNCDUer]

20. In Buffalo it's more like:

"Due to 17 inches of snow in the past hour, all schools are operating on a half-hour delay."

[A HERETIC I AM]

21. LOL! Buffalo don't let no 17 inch "dusting" bring things to a halt!

I lived in Palmdale, CA (gets about 30 days a year where there are clouds in the sky and about 20 days of rain a year) from late '01 through '04 and if i am not mistaken they once actually cancelled school because it RAINED too hard!

[ProfessorGAC]

23. Really?

Now that's being weather sissies! Geez, when tornadoes go through here, they herd the kids into the gym. That way a single roof collapse can inflict maximum casualties.

Now, that's weather machoism!
The Professor

[Retired AF Dem]

43. Putting all the kids in one place

makes it easier to find all the bodies. Don't have to waste time searching the entire school.

[ProfessorGAC]

22. Yeah. That Makes Sense!

Chicago-area schools seem to go into closure mode around the 6 or 8" mark. Especially if it's super cold after the snowfall.

But, yeah; Buffalo goes into partial delay mode at about a foot and a half.
The Professor

[JustABozoOnThisBus]

37. In Chicago, it causes Regime Change

Didn't Jane Byrne get elected because of a snowstorm?

Bilandic was a little slow getting the freeways cleared. His statue was toppled by the masses.

[radfringe]

11. phew... glad we got 8 inches then...

those 7 extra inches of snow saved our lives...

[PCIntern]

14. Oh...

you were referring to the STORM...not to some anatomical region...

sorry...

[Marrah_G]

12. In RI/MA yesterday it actually ended up WORSE then they predicted

This is an area where massive storms are not new to us. But the speed of the snow and the timing just completely fucked us up.

People on the rt 128 were stuck for 10 hours. in Providence School kids were stuck on school buses stranded on highways for almost 10 hours also. It was crazy. My 20 minute drive took 2 hours.

I'd rather have them thinking it was going to be worse then it is, then to think it won't be as bad as it was.

[PCIntern]

15. We have that too on occasion but

my point was that the degrees Fahrenheit never went below or even near, 32.

[slampoet]

35. Things are bad in Rhode Island because of Privatization and not the storms really.

Most snow bound areas have the local municipality or county seat own the plow trucks and when government owns the plow trucks they can send out their government employees at almost any hour to start plowing before a storm hits.

Since Rhode Island has private snow plowing contracts that are handed out as political favors, the private snow plow people all need to head home or to where their plows are parked. These are all over the place instead of one central city garage. Plow truck drivers became lost in the general traffic jam yesterday instead of being able to clear a coordinated path of plowing from a central origin point. Also private trucks that do plow make some streets worse. Since private operators maintain their own truck they often scrape with the blade an inch or more above the road surface. Then in a fit of guilt they will drop more road salt thinking that makes up for it, when instead it just increases the layer of ice on the road surface. A public truck operator doesn't care about making the plow blade last 40 years so they scrape the snow down to the asphalt before they need to use salt.

Essentially those poor children were stuck on buses because their corrupt local politicians are doling out these plowing contracts to their cousins.

[cali]

16. Aaarggh. I like snow but I'm fucking buried in it. It's been snowing for

5 days here, and there's over two feet of it on the ground. And this weekend we'll get another foot.

[Dulcinea]

17. Happens regularly in Atlanta.

If there's even a remote possibility of flurries, everyone runs to the store as fast as they can to buy all the milk & bread in the metro area. It makes me laugh, even after living here almost 20 years.

My job requires that I be there, no matter what the weather. I'm not afraid to drive in the (dusting of) snow; I'm more afraid of people who don't know what they're doing!

[momster]

28. This Weather Report Brought to You

by the Milk and Bread Consortium.

[Buns_of_Fire]

41. Oddly enough, many of those people are from the north!

They come from climes that deal with it on a regular basis. Southern cities just don't tend to spend as much on snow-removal and deicing equipment, since it doesn't get used that often. So that 1/4" of snow may wind up having another 1/4" of ice underneath! Northern-type people who just assume that that sort of stuff is just naturally taken care of, often find out that it isn't necessarily taken care of.

(Of course, you have to add in the factor that people around Atlanta can't drive worth beans under the best of conditions, and that naturally complicates things. And I say that as a long-term Atlanta driver! )

[sharp_stick]

18. You can always tell when we're going to get snow

in Connecticut no less, the weather guy rolls his sleeves up. I shit you not this is his "I'm gettin' to work look". It's so pathetic, and believe it or not the channel 3 (CBS I think) dolts name these damned things. Yesterday was "Winter Storm Alexander"

[KamaAina]

32. Oh yes, the channel 8 (ABC in New Haven) dolts have named 'em for years

my all-time favorite CT weather moment came during "Storm Josh", when chief dolt Dr. Mel and dolt-in-waiting Geoff Fox nearly came to blows on-air over whether southeastern Conn. was going to change over to rain, keeping their totals down!

[radfringe]

25. look at it this way

snow/storm alerts are what you have when you don't have a terror alert..

just be thankful that old man winter doesn't put out a video claiming responsibility and threatening more storms if we don't stop screwing up the environment....

meanwhile I think bush is preparing a terror-weather speech... the iranians hates our weather

[LeftishBrit]

26. Try living in England, when two snowflakes fall from the sky...

EVERYTHING seems to become chaotic! We're not geared up for even small amounts of snow (or indeed any form of weather, it sometimes seems!), and the pavements and roads become icy; there are massive delays in public transport, etc. A few years ago, a delay on British Rail was famously ascribed to 'the wrong kind of snow'.

[Mad_Dem_X]

29. The State of DE is the same way

We get an inch of snow predicted, and suddenly the supermarkets are crammed with people buying bread and milk. You'd think they were all going to be snowbound for weeks.

[sharp_stick]

34. And batteries!

I remember that, I lived in Wilmington several years ago and as soon as the snow hit I noticed that the stores were devoid of bread, milk and batteries of all sizes. This happened every storm, I guess they forgot where they put the batteries from 2 months ago.

[Golden Raisin]

30. In NYC if 2 .5 flakes of snow fall

or are even seen dimly on the horizon, all the local channels start screaming W-I-N-T-E-R S-T-0-R-M!!!!!!! It's ridiculous and takes credibility away from when a serious, dangerous weather event might occur.

[LibertyLover]

33. Washington DC is the same

I swear this city thinks it is on the Equator. Every year it's the same thing - we get a 3 or 4 inch snow storm and the entire city comes to a halt. About 14 years ago we did have a nasty ice storm and a prolonged cold spell which caused ice to build up on the Potomac. Coal barges couldn't get up-river to deliver coal to the electrical generating plants and the mayor closed the city down for a couple of days to save power. I was working at a private law firm and we had a transaction going to signing so we had to come in. Driving was difficult because of the ice and metro was very slow, but I made it without too much angst (we got fined by the city for working because we were deemed non-essential, but that wasn't my problem). Legal counsel on the other side was in Toronto and they asked for some documents to be turned around overnight. We had to tell them that we couldn't because we had no secretarial personnel, no way of getting them out by Fedex and limited electricity because of the storm. They asked how much snow we had, and when we told them 2 to 3 inches plus ice, there was dead silence on the other end of the phone. After a minute we asked if they were still on the line. They replied that they were, but were just amazed we couldn't get what they wanted done. We had to explain that the city was, quite literally, closed by mayoral order. They were not impressed.

[PCIntern]

36. As a dentist I am most amazed

by the sudden need for elective dental work when it snows...

As we're cancelling people b/c my staff has to get home during a real snowstorm, people are calling saying that their businesses are closed so this would be a great time to come over. They get really pissy when we tell them that they can come over, but that we won't be here, b/c OUR business has to close for the same reason that their business has to close. Narcissists everywhere...

BTW, Milk, bread, batteries...and sanitary protection are the most demanded items during these snow 'emergencies'.

[MiniMe]

40. I remember that time

If I recall correctly, there was a serious artic blast and the temperature was below zero for at least a week, which is unusual in the DC area. I think the Mayor shut down the city because of electricity generating concerns for heating. They shut down the city to save the electricity grid to heat homes.

This area goes crazy when they even mention the "s" word. I think part of it is the number of diplomats in the area, that has always been one theory of mine. When you get diplomats from places like Africa who have never seen a snowflake before, they really don't know how to drive in the snow. Snow I can deal with, but I absolutely HATE ice, and it seems like we are perpetually on that damn snow/ice line, I think it is painted somewhere right through the area.

[mwb970]

38. When did body counts become part of weather reporting?

All of the weather stories in the paper and on TV these days prominently feature death in the headlines:

"Four dead in Minnesota blizzard"

"Torrential rains kill three in Texas"

"Two believed dead after wind blows in Iowa"

"Man injured as clouds form in Ohio skies"

When I was a kid in the 60s, we seemed to take snow in winter and rain in summer in stride. Now they are another source of fear and bedwetting. "It's going to snow! It's going to snow! Whatever shall we do? Help us! Help us!" Good grief.

And now we have to have body counts in every weather story like there was some kind of Global War On Weather for us all to fear.

I love America, but we are becoming a truly ridiculous nation.

[SoCalDem]

42. Out here when it drizzles, we have Storm-reporters out everywhere

in slickers, galoshes & holding huge golf umbrellas.

They break in constantly with UPDATES from StormtrackerDoplerSooperDooper Weather Helicopter 3000X

"Yep it's wet out here"..back to you Barbie"..