winter_rules

Is there any evidence (either way) that multiple early storms reduce the chance of a larger storm(s) later? I could see early storms releasing some of the latent heat energy from the water, but it wouldn’t shock me if the duration and relative size of a few storms might not have much effect, if any, on the overall energy stored in the Atlantic/Gulf. Any thoughts?

I know it’s not really applicable coming from the tropics, but imagine that track up the coast in the winter....

Yes, there won’t be another 40 day streak of 80+ this summer so we are sliding downhill now! Really, really, really slowly for another few weeks.... People in our office who complain about the weather being too cold 8 months of each year were recently complaining about it being too hot this summer. That cracks me up....people are never happy no matter what the situation is. That doesn’t just apply to weather, either!

Good point. My default image of upstate NY consists of semi-elevated rural areas, but of course most people live in populated areas that are generally lower elevation and near water. My property is usually a +/-5 degree difference compared to when we “go into town.”

Not my kind of weather either. Too hot to do any productive work outside. I wonder if the guy who kept posting about this summer’s forecast ever got central air installed. I would never suggest it for someone from upstate NY but, ironically, this summer is trending toward one where it may be useful. Dropped to 50 degrees last night though, so that was a nice surprise. I’m also shocked to see that the number of annual 90 degree days in Buffalo is trending downward over the last +/-century. That seems very counterintuitive relative to all other temperature trends I have heard about.

I was in the Elmira/Corning area on Thursday and it’s really dry there. In Addison and Woodhull, SW of Corning, lawns are 90% brown and crunchy. Seems like mid-August, not mid-June!

Wow! It seems like it would be a relief to have had it and hopefully be past it. Is it actually a relief for you?

Congratulations! I will certainly miss your posts - it was fantastic to have someone posting from about a mile from my old house that we sold in the fall of 2012 (which seems like a lifetime ago!). I still really like that area. Nice and rural, good snow, but only 4-5mi from the convenience of Pulaski and 6-7mi from the mini-ocean of Lake Ontario. Good luck with your new ventures!

I haven’t been listening daily but I just can’t understand how anyone can speak for even one full hour every single day for months on this subject. The only thing that changes every day is a few statistics. Seems like 3 minutes would be sufficient most days with a weekly big picture update. I guess I’m just not a politician....

Man that stinks. Yet another longer term ripple effect of this shut down. My wife is also a teacher and we’re curious to see what happens next school year, both in terms of position cuts and the overall school schedule/mechanics of going to school.

23° this morning. That makes 11 straight days of lows in the 20s in May. Several of those days were in the low 20s and yesterday actually dropped to 19° for a short period of time.

Getting home to 32° and snow. Lawn turning white again. Today makes 5 consecutive days with snow in the air, with 4 of those days having snow on the ground!! Crazy for mid-May.

That may be the first time I have seen the expected snowfall map be much lower than the “high end amount.” It strikes me as odd how often the high end amount is very close to the expected amount....and then we’re always disappointed when the storm underperforms. That may just be my pessimistic perception after a terrible winter....I’ll try to pay more attention to it next winter.

I agree with this completely. At no point did we have 6in or more on the ground after November, but it was white +/-90% of the time. Always needed “just one more” clipper. Instead we would get a cutter and start over.

We were actually overcast almost all day. A few peaks of sun off and on was it. Still felt nice, though. It seems like most of the recent warmer days were also very windy so they didn’t feel nearly as warm as today did. Back down to the new Spring normal for upstate NY for the next few days into weeks. I’ve said it before but with winters being warm, or at least very inconsistent, for the past few winters, it really feels like 6 straight months of 35-45° highs with a few higher/lower days mixed it. Not quite cold enough for real winter and not quite warm enough to be enjoyable.

You’re not kidding about the Mayflies! Semi-ruined an otherwise nice day.

Quarantine will do that.... But seriously, congratulations and good luck!

About 5.5” in the NW Catskills at about 1,700ft. Pic below is from around 10am. It has been flurrying/lightly snowing all day. Very wintry feel the past few days. Where was this 3 months ago?? I haven’t figured out how to flip the photo, but you get the idea. It’s white outside.

Dumb question: Can someone explain, in layman’s terms, how the government can just create several trillion dollars seemingly out of thin air? I live in a simple world where a dollar is a bartering measure, just like a bushel of corn was back in the day. If you think your product/service is worth 2 dollars/bushels of corn and I agree, then I give you the corn/dollar in exchange for the product/service. I always assumed the nation’s debt was in the form of actual debt to bond holders/investors/other governments. Does the debt really even exist if we can just create massive sums of money with the passage of a bill? It’s not like someone just stepped in and offered TRILLIONS of dollars that we can now pay back with interest, right? Any good links to reputable sources that can explain this?

This seems inevitable, unfortunately.

I agree. There is a general resistance to change in any society/industry, but now that almost every society/industry in America is being forced to use as much automation as possible, eyes are being opened to the convenience and efficiency of it and there’s no going back. Goodbye to many brick and mortar stores. Not just because of this immediate hit to sales in the short term, but because less people will be going back into stores in the next 6-12-24 months than were going before this all started. With that said, I do think (hope?) restaurants will boom for an extended period when they open back up, as long as that happens fairly soon and the economy isn’t totally destroyed.

My wife (and therefore I) went through a similar scenario in the same timeframe. Graduated from college in 2007, but she didn't get a full time teaching job until 2012. Schools were either laying off teachers or not replacing those who retired. Then when things started improving, the schools had to offer the new openings to all those who had been laid off first. She kept taking long term sub positions (Pulaski and APW) and eventually earned a full time classroom teaching position. Like BW said, it was tough on her confidence. Teaching elementary kids is definitely the perfect career for her, but she was literally questioning it for YEARS. Wolfie, keep pushing on and you’ll earn yourself a good job!

I certainly don’t blame them at all. It is absolutely a smart move for them. I just wish they would take it a little more seriously. Ripping around on 4-wheelers in the dark, or having bonfires where everybody is drunk, is not exactly a smart move right now. They’ll end up in the hospital for a different ailment and catch it or spread it there.

We live in an area where many old rural farm properties are owned by city slickers from downstate/NYC/NJ/CT. These people are typically only visit their properties for the major summer holidays and the first week of rifle season. There are now multiple vehicles at most of these properties, with 4-wheelers running all over. Vehicles were parked on my property with people fishing my creek....I don’t really mind, but I have never met these people before. It feels like July 4th weekend. This “quarantine” is being treated as a summer vacation for many people. They/we had better hope this virus doesn’t hit hard around here because our little hospital won’t be able to handle more than a few of these cases at a time.

Also a wintry morning in the northern Catskills this morning. 27° and snowy roads (until I get near the Susquehanna valley). About an inch by 5:30am. They’re saying 4-8” above 1,600ft and my house is at about 1,700ft so we’ll see! After this winter, I would have preferred to just get rain today. 6” on mud in late March will just be a figurative kick in the you-know-what. I’m fairly certain I’m starting to see grass greening up in sunny/wet spots in the valleys already.