Most people think it does nothing but rain in the Northwest.? For those of you with that notion, you are mostly correct.? It rains here.? A lot.? So much so even we get sick of it.? No one ever steps out the door and says, “hmmm, looks like a nice day to be soggy.”? We don’t really like to having to wear “outdoor appropriate” shoes all the time.? A cute pair of sandals would be nice on occasion.
However, there are 2 months of the year that it barely rains.? That would be the latter half of July through the mid part of September.? Save that third weekend in August.? It always rains that weekend.? And you would think that since we only have 2 months of truly dry weather people would remember how to drive in wet conditions.? Oh God!? We live in the Northwest and it’s raining!? Whatever will we do?? Those first few days of rain cause traffic nightmares.
Now imagine snow.? If Northwesterners, who live in a rainy area, don’t know how to drive when it rains, imagine what happens when it snows.? We lived in Bellingham, WA* through college and our first year of marriage and the city didn’t even have a snow plow.? They had to rent the one the airport owned.
This morning we woke up to 1/2″ of snow.? We weren’t expecting snow until tomorrow.? And even then the forecast is 1-4″.? Normally snow would be no problem.? The trusty husband and I have the actual ability to drive in the snow.? However, this morning the trusty father-in-law was having knee replacement surgery.? This necessitated a drive south to sit at the hospital with the trusty mother-in-law.
Neither I nor the trusty husband wanted to wrangle a 3 year old in a hospital lobby so we pawned him off on my mother.? Mom lives in the sticks.? At 7:45 this morning she calls to let us know the freeway was pretty icy in their area so we might want to think about leaving a little later.? (surgery was scheduled for 9:30, was only 1 hour long, mom lives an hour away and 20 minutes from the hospital)
My mom is a hyper nut when it comes to snow.? She lives in the sticks really so I don’t blame her too much.? But what made the whole thing so much more comical is that as we had our morning coffee and watched the news we were watching the school closures and delays.? Did you happen to catch that snowfall total I mentioned above?? I’ll give you a minute to check it out again…? Did you roll your eyes yet?
Boy, I’m sure glad they canceled schools here.? I mean with all the snow and all.? Not sure what snow looks like in your part of the country, but in this here Northwest it is wet and green.? Oh wait, that’s moss.? There is no snow.? And schools were canceled.
BTW, the trusty father-in-law made it through surgery just fine and the MIL has called for a coffee already.
my word…come to Chicago and drive in our snow…it is loads of fun…I really like it
We got 4″ of snow at my house in Redmond….school’s closed here too! I’m loving the snow day, personally.
School’s out! At least 2 inches of snow in the land of no-sidewalks on the big hill …
I’ll post picture of our snowman later tonight.
Glad FIL is okay.
I have to laugh. We are from Pittsburgh – we know snow…we know snow on big hills and narrow, twisty roads. We know freeze your ass off in the wicked icy wind whipping off one of the 3 rivers cold. Here in TN, people FREAK OUT if it even spits a snow flurry. They had 3 hour school delays the other day but I couldn’t figure out if it was because there was a prediction of a dusting of snow or if it was due to cold (28 degrees I believe). Wimps. No wonder the North won the Civil War.
I have to tell you, in Anchorage, they always made fun of the way people in your area reacted to snow. I even heard stories of people leaving their cars on the road and walking home when the roads were icy.
Hahaha…we may have y’all beat. Here in AL we cancel school for the mere POSSIBILITY of snow!
It is true that there were many an abandoned car this morning.
It’s all relative. I live in the middle of my state and we don’t get nearly as much snow as the northern part of the state. We’ll close when the roads are icy and there are several new inches of snow. The northern part of the state doesn’t close schools until the ice is actually forming on car tires themselves.
Full on, true to life, blizzard here today. I grew up with snow and have never seen anything like what we had today. You could not see across the street for hours and hours of blowing, blinding snow. Our covered porch had 10 inches, our yard which usually dips downhill from our porch now has a three foot incline up from the porch. Amazing.
I live in Park City, Utah. Ski country. Still, even we were amazed today.
Ronda
Where I grew up school didn’t get cancelled unless we had 7″ of new snow. Fast forward to living in Houston. They measure the temperature below freezing by the hours. Seriously. They cancel everything if it might, possibly, maybe snow a teeny bit. Not just schools, they will close DOWNTOWN. It’s crazy!
The snow was fun!! You could have pawned the darndest cutest godson on his godmother you know…..we would have had a blast with him yesterday 🙂 Glad to hear that Ken is doing well, He will enjoy the rehab…hee, hee, hee (tell him to take is pain meds)
I canceled class tonight because the school didn’t close (and we have 6-8 inches).
I’d feel safer driving in Spokane where there are months of snow and people actually know what they are doing. Around here, we don’t see it often enough to get a clue.
uhm . . . cancelled
you moderate me? I’m crushed!
well for crying out loud, if you are going to moderate me, at least help me out with the spelling
Nah…you should be in the deep south. It’s quite humorous there. Possible snow accumulation of 1/4″ overnight? CLOSE SCHOOLS!!!!! nevermind tomorrows temps are supposed to reach 45…and all that snow would melt. 😉
It was like living in Tucson, AZ when it rained. I swear people pulled over to the side of the interstate when it started sprinkling!
I am from New England, so I’m continually amazed at how stooopid the snow handling is here. Take the other day for example: 2 hour delay. What are delays supposed to be for? So you can plow the frikkin roads around the schools, maybe shovel the sidewalks, maybe throw down a little kitty litter. It’s only about an inch, no problem at all to take care of that in under half an hour and make sure it doesn’t ice over. A little simple prevention.
Nuh-uh. The most icy road in this neighborhood is the one that runs right by the school. So, I get to make my 7 year old miss an afternoon of sledding and still slip and slide up to the school. Next time, we’re just going to play hooky.