weathafella

The '66 Christmas event had my brother and I shoveling the front sidewalk of my Dad's pharmacy. There was a wave of men dropping dead of heart disease then so if there were able bodied offspring they were the default shovelers. It was nice snow-maybe 4-6 inches in the Englewood/Tenafly area. Mostly occurred Christmas morning similar to 2017 here but not as cold.

1957. I believe the storm was 12/4-5. In those days kids came home for lunch and my mother made a nice little lunch bday party for me having just turned 11 on the 1st. It was cloudy with the sky lowering and clouds thickening but temperatures were a problem. We ended up with a foot+ from the dynamic nature of the snow. So yes-12/5 was seared into my memory early. It was within a few days of that date the following year for our first meaningful snow. 50s/60s were early winters really lasting into the early 70s.

Yeah I park in Coolidge Corner and either walk or take the green line depending on my timing.

In December,, 1960, my father scored Giants tickets against the expansion Cowboys who were 0-7 up to that point. They managed to tie the Giants that nearly 70 degree day 12/4/60. As that week progressed, temperatures stepped down to normal but the following Saturday was still 40s by day dropping sub freezing Saturday night. I wake up Sunday to what was then "provisional heavy snow warning" which is akin to WS Watch today. My mother made me sweep the oak leaves out of the garage and I happily did it as we faced north and the stinging wind carrying termperatures in the low 20s was in my face. Cirrus was spreading across the sky which by mid day was starting to blot out the sun. I turn on the Giants/Washington game at DC and the announcers start by saying we're having a blizzard in Washington! YA Tittle hits Del Shofner who scored the TD and ended in a snowbank. by 3PM it begins snowing lightly with the temperature near 20. It was one of those deals where it took forever to develop but unbeknownst to me the secondary was bombing off Hatteras and slowing down. We had an inch from 3-9PM. Then things began ramping up and at bedtime, with my bedroom facing the side of the house, I often opened the window and stuck my head out and craned my neck to check out the street light across the street-and low and behold it was starting to snow hard. I woke up at 5 AM to a raging blizzard-one of the all timers given the wind gusts exceeding 50 MPH at times, temperature of 9F, and heavy snow. Looking back and reflecting on Tip's post above, I am thinking that's how you do a December blizzard. We ended up with 18-24 throughout much of the area. It was one of 3 biggies to hit DC-New England during that glorious winter of 1960-61.

For those interested...

While many are gong to the Funky Murphy GTG on 12/2, let's renew the Boston GTG at Clarke's Boston at Faneuil Hall. I'm proposing Tuesday, 12/20/2023 (5 days before Christmas) for a festive night of weenie city. Clarke's is the last place many of us saw James when he came with his friend. I'm glad we got a chance to meet him in person before his sad departure. Post your interest ITT. Will and Garth have expressed interest and many others have come in the past. Let's do this and bring back snowy winters! Tuesday 12/19 (apparently Clarke's is no longer open Mondays per web hours listed).' https://www.clarkesboston.com/index.html

May not show up positive before Wednesday either way.

That’s fine. I’m still going to try and make it.

I think I voted 12/16 but I can do 12/9 also. What time is the start 12/2?

Since it is my birthday weekend, we have dinner reservations Saturday night. They include our daughter and her bf. We also have stuff at home Friday dinner with a larger group including some cousins. I’m just not sure I can fit it all in this weekend. If I come or will probably be for a short time early.

The Pacific doesn't look good really until near mid December. Oh we'll get some cold shots but timing is everything probably until around 12/15. GEFS appear to have taken a step back tonight not surprisingly. MJO progs have been less favorable until post 12/5-7 and by the time we get the atmospheric response we're nearing mid month. Remember folks, this year is about one day later than the earliest possible Thanksgiving. So it's quite early still and mid December is nearly 3 weeks away.

I remember rain increasing in intensity Friday morning and heavy wain and wind all night with a rapid flip to snow around 7AM Saturday continuing into Saturday night. I also recall milder wx for a while after that storm passed. Inauguration Day 1993 for Clinton’s first term was very warm here-60+.

I think that was 12/10/92 but yes. Tip’s rendition of the rain/snow line crashing SE observed on campus at UMASS Lowell was a masterpiece.

That has to sting with areas near BOS getting close to 100!

I-70 belt in KS getting 2-4 tonight.

Yes but it kind of petered out February and March. We had the near miss in March which left a sour taste in my mouth. Really nice December and January though.

2013-14 was a tad subpar here. What did you get for 1993-94?

Yeah you work with the budget you’re given and hope there’s enough pressure to change it-although the average voter could care less so that’s not happening.

Incidentally even well into the first week of December our normal max for most in sne is >40. Heck, today’s normal high at BOS is 48.

Move 100 miles north and maybe. When you’re above 850 with SE LLVL winds you aren’t snowing or icing. But your day will come by late in the week of 12/4.

It’s like no one in NWS cares about important climo records at first order stations. Very disappointing.

Through 11/24: BOS: -1.3F BDL: -1.9F ORH: -0.7F PVD: -2.6F Do we * PVD? I think today and tomorrow may add some negs which should dented at least a few days in the final week of the month so the numbers above are IMHO close to what we'll see in the end.

So much anecdotal info in my head. I had this impression that a good November snow wise was very positive for a good snow season in Boston. Then I looked at the data and it’s literally all over the place. In the least snow in a season for BOS occurred when half the total happened in November. So I looked at all Novembers with 2.0 or greater snow totals at BOS. There were 26 of them in all of the data back 142 years. Keep in mind that the data from Logan airport began in 1935. The mean for the winter when Boston received 2.0 or more snow officially is 39.89 inches with a range from 9.0-110.6. Incidentally the 142 year long term average is 43.1. So I’m relaxing as raw snow totals on November aren’t really correlated too much.

All of my friends around my age get unreasonably angry when I get happyof snow is coming….

I can’t say I hated 3 days of 65-70 with sunny conditions in the Bay Area but I’m looking forward to coming home today-should be en route in minutes as the rest of the plane boards. I think the week of 12/4 may give many a good threat. So far it’s not last winter.