IrishRob17

The amount of weenies in this forum that cannot handle the factual truth so far this winter season is somehow shocking to me. 

1 hour ago, donsutherland1 said:

The Snow Returns

The calendar marched into January. There was no snow in Snowtown.

To the local residents, it seemed that their village had taken its name from a time that was now in danger of being lost forever. In coming years, only the oldest residents would be able to say that they had actually experienced a snowfall. Once they departed, they would take their precious winter memories with them.

Snowtown found itself mired in the grips of a dreadful multi-year snow drought. Even the GFS computer model had abandoned its long-range fantasy snowstorms. Those digital depictions had continually raised hopes. Yet, over and over again, those hopes were dashed on the jagged rocks of reality, as the promised winter storms never materialized. It appeared that the GFS model had finally surrendered to reality.

Everyone in the village had taken notice. At the local college, students taking the Philosophy 101 course used the absence of snow to argue their understanding of eternity. The local shops that still sold a range of winter goods were placed on an “endangered business list” that the local Chamber of Commerce had compiled to bring attention to the village’s plight. Snowtown's winter charm was disappearing just as the snows had vanished into a receding past.

The only places snow could be found were on aging photographs, digital images, and the paintings that hung in the local art gallery. The gap that divided imagery from real experience was an unbridgeable one.

The two century-old Maple Tree that dated to the village’s establishment still stood. One day, its rings would tell amazing stories to any scientist who examined them. It had weathered droughts, violent thunderstorms, pounding hail, torrents of rain, howling blizzards, and two hurricanes. During summers, the shade from its thick leaves provided a measure of refuge from the wrath of an increasingly vengeful sun that ruled summers that now stretched from late May into October.

The night was mild. Large, heavy raindrops began to fall. Within minutes, rivulets ran along the curbsides. Water ponded in opportunistic spots. The wind freshened. It would be another wild, mild, and wet night.

By midnight, most of the village’s residents had fallen asleep as the soaking rain beat against their windows. A few college students labored into the night: writing, cutting, pasting, and re-writing. The tedious sound of the falling rain added to their exhaustion. Caffeinated drinks had lost their power to stave off sleep.

Ella, a tall platinum blond international student from Paris, tried to push on. Although fluent in English, her thoughts increasingly began to flow in French. The paper required English. Fatigue had broken down her fluency. Now, she had to work to translate her French-language thoughts into English-language text.

“I need another cappuccino,” she thought to herself. She walked quickly into the small kitchen in the 19^th century home that had been converted into dorms for the college students. Through muscle memory, she quickly whipped up a giant mug of steaming cappuccino. She placed the ceramic mug, which featured Claude Monet’s “Snow at Argenteuil,” next to her laptop.

She glanced at the screen. She read through the last paragraph she had written. She prepared to write with renewed vigor. And then there was darkness.

Sometime late at night, the unusually intense storm tapped into a distant air mass that was just cold enough to support snow. In almost a flash, the driving rain gave way to wet snow. The swirling snowflakes fell thick and fast, shrouding the quaint village as if it were cloaked in fog. The wet snow plastered everything it encountered. Snowtown’s charming residential streets were quickly covered in a thickening blanket of white.

Ella suddenly awakened. The sound of the furious raindrops that had been lashing her dorm’s windows had fallen silent. Not completely silent. It seemed as if gusts of wind rose time and again to hurl bursts of countless tiny pellets against the glass that separated Ella from the raging elements outside. The wind had taken on a different, less mournful, tone, too.

Ella opened her eyes. The room seemed brighter. Her faithful lamp that illuminated her small desk shone on. Her laptop’s screen saver glowed from the light of the Monet that had supplanted her Word document. But the lighting really was different.

“What time is it…?” she asked herself. Ella realized that despite her frantic last-second effort to arm herself with caffeine to work through the night, she had succumbed to sleep.

The gusts of wind flung the heavily falling snow against the windows. Now awake, Ella sought to resume her writing. She hit “Enter” and the screen saver was gone in an instant. Ella’s document was again on the screen. Twelve-point Times New Roman text had replaced the Impressionist masterpiece. Now she would write.

But she did not start. Her growing curiosity about what was happening outside had become an unstoppable force that drew her away from her laptop to the window. She had to see whatever it was that pulled her away from her assignment.

She opened the Venetian blinds. The old, dreary wet world was gone. A new magical one had come into existence.

Having lived through the brutal heat of Parisian summers marked by intense heatwaves with temperatures of 40°C (104°F or above) and having never seen snow before, she hurriedly put on her overcoat, scarf and boots. Concluding that there would be no class in the coming day, she stepped outside to explore the new world that was before her.

Note: All images were generated using multiple AI platforms. The first image was also processed in Sepia. No text was generated by AI.

 

 

Well done Don

52 minutes ago, gravitylover said:

Water is still pumping out of the ground and our driveway is a half inch thick layer of ice from edge to edge. The street below is a 20 foot wide ice slick and the street leans to the downhill side so it's pretty sketchy to drive by and the downhill neighbors can't park in their driveway because they can't get out. We've been parking on the front lawn all week because our cars would slide out and right into the neighbors bedroom. What a pain in the ass. 

That all certainly sucks, sorry you have to go through that.

12 minutes ago, Stormlover74 said:

Its only 12/19, we still have time...LOL

8 minutes ago, hudsonvalley21 said:

The ground is saturated plus the vegetation that has shut down made an impact on the water levels in the creeks and streams.

 

I was explaining this to folks in the office this morning.  Stuff weather geeks know LOL

The water gage near the hospital in Middletown is higher now than it was in July, not by much but it also hasn't crested yet, although its getting close.

3 minutes ago, hudsonvalley21 said:

Very impressive system, 3.84 since midnight along with 0.60” Sunday up to midnight gives me 4.44” for the event total.

After an average October, and a below average November, right back into above average precipitation with 6.13" so far this month. Sitting right near 65" for the year...why not make a run at 70"? Back in the day we'd say "no way" to that much more this month, sadly nowadays its not as crazy as it may sound to some.

3.03" looks to be the total.  Lowest pressure was 983.5mb around 9:30am.  After a high of 60 a little after 6:30am we've been cooling, 45/42 currently, will see the sun very shortly.

If it was only that simple...

10 minutes ago, crossbowftw3 said:

Almost no wind overnight which was quite a relief but did record about 2.5” of rain if the nearest meso site reporting is accurate 

Had a few gusts in the past couple of hours but nothing like to my south and east, up to 2.57” and pouring again. Lots of flooded roads out there this morning. 60/59, a truly festive feeling this morning out there…

I don’t remember the details of everything like some can, one of the reasons I write things in a spreadsheet now LOL. Some events though.. there are parts of it I can recall like yesterday but certainly not all of them. 

10 minutes ago, donsutherland1 said:

New York City has unlocked another sad winter record, as its unprecedented streak without 1" or more snowfall reaches 671 days today. New York City will record its 686th consecutive day without 2" or more daily snowfall. Both streaks look likely to continue through at least the next week, if not longer.

700 looks easily reachable at the moment. 

12 minutes ago, Hitman said:

That was filmed in the mrv vt.  Will be there for the holiday.

Yea, some classic northern New England scenes. Hopefully, but doubtful, it’ll look similar to that for you. 

1 minute ago, SACRUS said:

From 28 to 58 today.  

 

 

26 to 55 here today

On this date in 1981 areas in this thread were in the midst of a decent snowstorm. I think I've talked about it before in here but that's not going to stop me from talking about it again.  We lived in Fishkill at the time.  I have some vivid memories of this storm, I was nine years of age and recall working on Christmas decorations/ornaments with my Cub Scout pack.  It was pretty exciting to have gifts for my parents that I created, all while a raging snowstorm was occurring during the holiday season. The storm started on the 14th, I found this from a NY Times article in the 12/15/81 paper: "Yesterday afternoon's snow turned into heavy rain last night in New York City, but continued to fall heavily across Rockland County, portions of eastern New York, the Catskills and Connecticut."  Looking at various COOP reports, which can be a bit sketchy but still tell a story, it appears the storm lasted until late on the 16th or early on the 17th depending on location.  Some local NY snow totals from those observations:

Gardiner: 18" (seems a bit high but who knows)

Glenham: 10.5"

Liberty: 9"

Walden: 11"

Westchester Airport: 6.5"

Yorktown: 11"

The records show a couple of refreshers, one on 18th/19th and another on the 23rd, each were a trace up to two inches, location dependent.  Temps started warming up on Christmas Eve so the pack began melting but held on enough to make it an official White Christmas.  Seeing this Miller commercial in regular rotation on tv was more than fitting during that December of yore.

33 minutes ago, CPcantmeasuresnow said:

Hellooooooooo!!!!!!! Is anyone here?

Three days without comments? Is this hangover from the non winter of 22/23 or disgust with the beginning of the Winter, and I use the term loosely now just to reference a season that once existed, of 23!24?

low of 27 this morning already near freezing. The average low this day is 20. I haven't seen that yet this season. 

Good morning.  I’ve been formulating a reminiscent post this morning for later today, need to confirm a few things in the archives but I digress. Low of 26 here, also the current temp. 

2.01” for the event, just over 61.5” for the year.  Didn’t see any flakes here. 

1.91" so far puts me over 60" for the year...yay...

3 hours ago, EastonSN+ said:

Each forum tends to have its own flavor.

If you want snowfall optimism the Middle Atlantic and New England forums are for you.

If you want warmth optimism this is your forum.

 

And neither flavor has any impact on what actually happens so I don't know why some get so bent out of shape.  

1 hour ago, coastalplainsnowman said:

In fairness, the Jets could play all their home games at Atacama Desert Stadium and they would still always be sloppy.

IMO, the Jets haven't played a home game since they left Shea Stadium.

58 minutes ago, gravitylover said:

It flaked for a few hours, sometimes it was flurries. Whatever fell yesterday melted while it was snowing today. 

So you actually had a "pack", nice. I was just being a smart ass, if you can imagine that

On 12/3/2023 at 12:29 PM, Rjay said:

Oof FSU @BxEngine

I was actually in the Gaylord Texan on Sunday morning, not as part of the CFP Committee clearly but to see ‘ICE featuring The Grinch’ which was pretty incredible, just google it but I digress.  While walking through the place we came across two women decked out in FSU gear with signs and everything.  I asked them if they were related to @BxEngine to which I got blank stares and “Who?”  My wife then reminded me that we had tickets for the ICE thing and we didn’t have time to find out if some ladies were related to that weenie.  

GO IRISH!  Who have essentially no receivers for the bowl game…

1 hour ago, Juliancolton said:

All it ever does is snow these days

Pack refreshers are delightful

2 hours ago, psv88 said:

Yea years ago there was. I was certain he had won it lol

I thought he did too one year but Kevin beat him for Weenie of the Decade.

16 minutes ago, Juliancolton said:

I got 0.2". It's too bad the pack is getting wiped out on Sunday

Had a trace here

7 minutes ago, bluewave said:

What do you consider a torch? To me any December over 40° in NYC is warm. 

That's the problem with that silly term, it's arbitrary and the goal posts seem to change seasonally for many.