The Swamp

Gray, damp, and rainy today in Heidelberg:



But the castle (where my pic was taken from) and the Christmas markets! Yea, buddy!

Woke up to a foot or foot and a half of snow this morning. That's about what? 500 centimeters or something? It's still coming down, harder now than overnight and has since doubled since I took that pic. Oh, you can imagine the streets of Vancouver and environs! Last time this happened, couple of weeks ago or so, there was an accident in the city something like every 75 seconds. Ordinarily I'd stay the heck off the streets, or the "dodgecar courts" when this happens, but I've got a stress test in a couple of hours. My first one! Finally, I've arrived.



(Sorry, not a great shot; just aimed a small digital out the winduh.)

Scottie wrote:Woke up to a foot or foot and a half of snow this morning. That's about what? 500 centimeters or something? It's still coming down, harder now than overnight and has since doubled since I took that pic. Oh, you can imagine the streets of Vancouver and environs! Last time this happened, couple of weeks ago or so, there was an accident in the city something like every 75 seconds. Ordinarily I'd stay the heck off the streets, or the "dodgecar courts" when this happens, but I've got a stress test in a couple of hours. My first one! Finally, I've arrived.

Seems like all you'd have to do is talk to the doc about your drive to the office.

It been a crazy month. Most snow in December in Calgary since 1901.

First ice storm hit last night.

Stepped out this morning to check the situation - first step: "oh, I guess it melted." Second step: "not bad at all." Third step: no friction whatsoever and I took a tumble off the side of the porch. Luckily, I landed on a bush covered in snow under the ice crust, but there's a golf ball sized lump on my shin and the pain is shooting up and down my leg hours later.

And the big storm is about to hit - predicting an inch of ice on everything with power lines coming own etc. A real icy apocalypse on tap.

Really, considering it's the weekend and all, not too concerned... but god help us if the power goes out.

Drove through some treacherous fog on the 402 from Port Huron, MI to London, ON last night - visibility was about 25 feet for pretty much the entire length of it. Crazy.

Warmish and rainy! Oh Canada! Actually could have been a lot worse, especially since I basically do not own legit winter clothing.

It's reading the Sunday paper and drinking coffee on the back porch weather! This is great.

rass wrote:It's reading the Sunday paper and drinking coffee on the back porch weather! This is great.

Yeah, absolutely insane. I am comfortably wearing short sleeves with no jacket, while there is still some unmelted snow in the yard. It is supposed to hit the 70s. Thanks, Winter!

Just checked, back in the 30s on Tuesday with a low of 18. I predict everyone gets a cold. Fuck you, Winter!

I changed into shorts.

And I'm planning on fighting off a minor cold with some beer this afternoon, so I should be well inoculated against the effect of the temperature change later this week.

Pruitt wrote:First ice storm hit last night.

Stepped out this morning to check the situation - first step: "oh, I guess it melted." Second step: "not bad at all." Third step: no friction whatsoever and I took a tumble off the side of the porch. Luckily, I landed on a bush covered in snow under the ice crust, but there's a golf ball sized lump on my shin and the pain is shooting up and down my leg hours later.

And the big storm is about to hit - predicting an inch of ice on everything with power lines coming own etc. A real icy apocalypse on tap.

Really, considering it's the weekend and all, not too concerned... but god help us if the power goes out.

Well, the fucking power did go out - for five days.

Just got back into my house a few hours ago - temperature in here is up to a balmy 49 degrees.

Could have been much worse - Mother in law is in florida and her condo is close enough to my home that I could check on the house a few times a day. And believe me, those were precious moments. 4 and sometimes 5 of us in a small one bedroom condo for five days... yeesh.

Do you have any idea what it's like to have your entire city shut down, trees everywhere, 600,000 without power on the first day (we were among the last 10% to get power back) and to have to get updates from Rob Ford?

Glad to hear you're doing ok. I've been listening to Toronto radio a lot over the past few days to get updates.

I hear that Ford was handing out food and fridge magnets for his re-election campaign.

Absent of any real powers, Ford was at least visiting the warming centres and some of the high rises where people were having problems.

Guy's a buffoon, but I'll say this about him - at least he put himself out there, where he became a bit of a lightning rod for people's frustration.

Our unelected Premier showed her true colours by reverting to bureaucratic weasel words and regurgitations of the hydro company's press releases.

And - please don't get me wrong, Ford didn't get my vote last time and won't get it in the next election - while Ford was being yelled at by angry cold people at a community centre where they were forced to live, our idiot Premier was wearing a hard hat while standing in front of a repair crew in my quiet neighbourhood. Made for lovely footage on the news - and no doubt for the upcoming election.

:(

degenerasian wrote::(

That is unbelievable! Any damage as a result?

Pruitt wrote:

degenerasian wrote::(

That is unbelievable! Any damage as a result?

nope. Transcanada is closed due to high winds and snow drifts but otherwise everything is fine.

I'm not sure that we got as much snow as they were calling for around here, but the road conditions were still pretty shitty due to the wind and the powdery snow. Even shittier was the fact that my local Starbucks was still not open by the time I finally rolled through.

6 degrees this morning. Coldest I can remember since our epic ice storm 10 years ago or so.

Supposed to be -6 on MOnday.

60 today. 20 and snow tomorrow.

At my mother's house outside of Lake Placid it was 28 below when she went to feed the dogs this morning.

snowing here again.

It's bad everywhere.

The first time I checked this morning, it was -8 degrees. Up to -2 now and that high of 3 is still to come! About eight inches of snow from the storm, but sunny out now.

Made for an adventuresome trip home from Detroit yesterday. Two canceled flights (the original to Syracuse and one to Binghamton after the door of the plane was closed) an ended up with a drive of 2:45 home from Rochester late last night.

DSafetyGuy wrote:The first time I checked this morning, it was -8 degrees. Up to -2 now and that high of 3 is still to come! About eight inches of snow from the storm, but sunny out now.

Made for an adventuresome trip home from Detroit yesterday. Two canceled flights (the original to Syracuse and one to Binghamton after the door of the plane was closed) an ended up with a drive of 2:45 home from Rochester late last night.

Flying into Bingo, eh? I think they are down to about 2 scheduled flights a day, yet they employ several hundred TSA employees.(not really, but there are way too many). There is one flight to Canada periodically, so Customs has to place someone there. Such a joke of an airport.

rass wrote: Even shittier was the fact that my local Starbucks was still not open by the time I finally rolled through.

It's 65 here today. And tomorrow. And the next day. And the day after that.

But I'll be keeping y'all in my prayers while I walk the dogs in shirtsleeves.

brian wrote:It's 65 here today. And tomorrow. And the next day. And the day after that.

But I'll be keeping y'all in my prayers while I walk the dogs in shirtsleeves.

My dog refuses to go more than five feet from the front steps before pissing and then running back inside.

(It's -2 fahrenheit and windy and icy. She's not as dumb as she looks)

brian wrote:It's 65 here today. And tomorrow. And the next day. And the day after that.

But I'll be keeping y'all in my prayers while I walk the dogs in shirtsleeves.

If it's that warm I think the dogs can go without fashionable tops, Brian.

AB_skin_test wrote:

brian wrote:It's 65 here today. And tomorrow. And the next day. And the day after that.

But I'll be keeping y'all in my prayers while I walk the dogs in shirtsleeves.

If it's that warm I think the dogs can go without fashionable tops, Brian.

Can't help if they're kind of dandies. I have to convince them not to wear bolo ties.

Oh, speaking of weather, SF/Green Bay are going to play what will likely be a top 3 coldest game in NFL history, which a chance at being the coldest. Brian is ripping Packer fans over it after a beautiful day's dog walk.

Gunpowder wrote:Oh, speaking of weather, SF/Green Bay are going to play what will likely be a top 3 coldest game in NFL history, which a chance at being the coldest. Brian is ripping Packer fans over it after a beautiful day's dog walk.

If I still lived in Detroit and the Lions were playing a home game in -20 degree weather (not that it's possible, but still) I'd fuckin' be there.

brian wrote:

Gunpowder wrote:Oh, speaking of weather, SF/Green Bay are going to play what will likely be a top 3 coldest game in NFL history, which a chance at being the coldest. Brian is ripping Packer fans over it after a beautiful day's dog walk.

If I still lived in Detroit and the Lions were playing a home game in -20 degree weather (not that it's possible, but still) I'd fuckin' be there.

I went to a Jets game in Buffalo that was close to 0 with a nasty wind chill below zero. You put on layers and grow a pair. One friend met us there coming back from a bachelor party with 2 other guys. They were supposed to drive my car home, but they couldn't find it in the parking lot. One idiot didn't even have socks on, was wearing a light windbreaker and t-shirt. The other guy wasn't dressed much better. Fortunately we saw them outside the stadium huddled around a burning garbage can. They were shaking so bad, they could barely speak.

The Sybian wrote:

brian wrote:

Gunpowder wrote:Oh, speaking of weather, SF/Green Bay are going to play what will likely be a top 3 coldest game in NFL history, which a chance at being the coldest. Brian is ripping Packer fans over it after a beautiful day's dog walk.

If I still lived in Detroit and the Lions were playing a home game in -20 degree weather (not that it's possible, but still) I'd fuckin' be there.

I went to a Jets game in Buffalo that was close to 0 with a nasty wind chill below zero. You put on layers and grow a pair. One friend met us there coming back from a bachelor party with 2 other guys. They were supposed to drive my car home, but they couldn't find it in the parking lot. One idiot didn't even have socks on, was wearing a light windbreaker and t-shirt. The other guy wasn't dressed much better. Fortunately we saw them outside the stadium huddled around a burning garbage can. They were shaking so bad, they could barely speak.

I went to a game that was 7 degrees and it was fuckin' awful.

If the Lions ever played outdoors and had a game like this, I wouldn't just assume a sellout.

I was at a number of Bills games that had wind chills below zero. I remember a game late in the regular season against the Raiders. So God damned cold that the plastic straps on my binoculars froze stiff.

My right hand still gets cold before the left - convinced that it was because my right hand froze at another Bills game. And why the right? Because that was my smoking hand, and it didn't matter how cold it was - Rich stadium was my ashtray.

I've been to CMU and Michigan football games for games in the teens with subzero wind chill. They managed to get 105,000 for a regular season hockey game in that kind of weather. I'm sure considering the Lions have had two home playoff games in 57 years, they'd sellout a 65,000 seat stadium regardless of the weather.

The Sybian wrote:

DSafetyGuy wrote:The first time I checked this morning, it was -8 degrees. Up to -2 now and that high of 3 is still to come! About eight inches of snow from the storm, but sunny out now.

Made for an adventuresome trip home from Detroit yesterday. Two canceled flights (the original to Syracuse and one to Binghamton after the door of the plane was closed) an ended up with a drive of 2:45 home from Rochester late last night.

Flying into Bingo, eh? I think they are down to about 2 scheduled flights a day, yet they employ several hundred TSA employees.(not really, but there are way too many). There is one flight to Canada periodically, so Customs has to place someone there. Such a joke of an airport.

Just wanted to get home yesterday, so, clearly, I was desperate.

Gunpowder wrote:I went to a game that was 7 degrees and it was fuckin' awful.

If the Lions ever played outdoors and had a game like this, I wouldn't just assume a sellout.

It would take an act of G-d for the Lions to play a home game in January. So of course it would sell out, no matter the temperature. There would be $10,000 seats on StubHub. Lots of people want to hang out with H-m.

DC47 wrote:

Gunpowder wrote:I went to a game that was 7 degrees and it was fuckin' awful.

If the Lions ever played outdoors and had a game like this, I wouldn't just assume a sellout.

It would take an act of G-d for the Lions to play a home game in January. So of course it would sell out, no matter the temperature. There would be $10,000 seats on StubHub. Lots of people want to hang out with H-m.

Exactly. But that's because of the historical ineptitude of the Lions. If they had a history of success I'd wager that it wouldn't be as fast to sell out.

I had a friend spend all of his student loan money to attend the Pats/Packers Super Bowl. Why? Because he never knew if the Pats (at that time a historically bad franchise) would ever make the Super Bowl again. Now people blame the Foxboro crowd for not be true fans.

Fuck. kept a heater on my pipes to make sure i still got hot and cold water for when it dropped to -40c here, but I forgot about the hose that pumps the water out of my shitty cabin like home. All the water that i used two mornings ago is trapped in my house! at least my sewage system still works. anyone got any tips on how to unfreeze the hose?

I went to the AFC championship game against Jaguars(!) that year the Pats went to the superbowl and got stuck with 2 tix and had to sell less than face at the stadium. Vividly remember that. So the Pats weren't that far off a blackout even back then.

TheHumanComa wrote:Fuck. kept a heater on my pipes to make sure i still got hot and cold water for when it dropped to -40c here, but I forgot about the hose that pumps the water out of my shitty cabin like home. All the water that i used two mornings ago is trapped in my house! at least my sewage system still works. anyone got any tips on how to unfreeze the hose?

Blow dryer?

Rainy, chilly, and gray. The uzsh.

(Berlin for New Years was uncharacteristically warmer than usual -- no snow, rain, or clouds. Everyone was out in full force.)

It's almost 60 right now. It should be in the single digits by the end of the day.

It's also raining right now, which combined with the high temperature is melting the 4+ inches of snow we got at the end of last week, so the entire region will turn into a sheet of ice as the temperature drops over night.