The Sky is Falling!
Honey child, let me tell you. Snow is serious business around these parts.
While many states have been dealing with snow for months, only in Ohio, specifically my little corner of the planet, Cincinnati, does snow engender such panic.
The local media breaks into every show and sometimes even commercials if the Doppler color coding turns even a little bit blue, pacing back in forth in front of green screens like a woman watching the stick to see if she's pregnant. Even if it's only going to be flurries, we are warned in ominous tones that snow is coming.
We listen to the media cry snow wolf so often that eventually we tune them out altogether. We tuned out all the way up until last Tuesday but that was a big mistake. The schools refused to release early because no one believed it was really going to snow and if did, no one thought it would be that bad.
So of course the snow started coming down exactly at the predicted time, 12 noon sharp. The soft pretty flakes soon banded together to form frozen immovable heaps and and did not stop until 8 p.m.leaving the ground covered with half a foot of snow. Before you could say,'Where's my kid?' traffic was snarled well past midnight with some kids not getting off the school bus until after 10 p.m.
Having gone several days with no new snowfall and the streets and sidewalks sufficiently clear everyone has been back to complacentville until today. Today the weather folk went into over-hype-drive predicting anywhere from 12 - 18 inches of snow for tomorrow.
A city once frost bitten, twice shy. The snow panic began shortly after the announcement. I went out to do my normal grocery shopping today and every store was full. Even my local Aldi which only recently began keeping Sunday hours was full. It seems my secret weapon for last minute Sunday shopping is no longer a secret. Everyone and their grandmother was shopping today as if the only way to survive the upcoming snowfall is to have blueberry pop tarts on hand (only frosted will do).
No one understands how Cincinnati reacts to snow better than internationally acclaimed local cartoonist Jim Borgman. His blog is absolutely wonderful and this entry at his site entitled "The White Death: A Portfolio" gives a picture perfect view of what snow in Cincy is all about.
While many states have been dealing with snow for months, only in Ohio, specifically my little corner of the planet, Cincinnati, does snow engender such panic.
The local media breaks into every show and sometimes even commercials if the Doppler color coding turns even a little bit blue, pacing back in forth in front of green screens like a woman watching the stick to see if she's pregnant. Even if it's only going to be flurries, we are warned in ominous tones that snow is coming.
We listen to the media cry snow wolf so often that eventually we tune them out altogether. We tuned out all the way up until last Tuesday but that was a big mistake. The schools refused to release early because no one believed it was really going to snow and if did, no one thought it would be that bad.
So of course the snow started coming down exactly at the predicted time, 12 noon sharp. The soft pretty flakes soon banded together to form frozen immovable heaps and and did not stop until 8 p.m.leaving the ground covered with half a foot of snow. Before you could say,'Where's my kid?' traffic was snarled well past midnight with some kids not getting off the school bus until after 10 p.m.
Having gone several days with no new snowfall and the streets and sidewalks sufficiently clear everyone has been back to complacentville until today. Today the weather folk went into over-hype-drive predicting anywhere from 12 - 18 inches of snow for tomorrow.
A city once frost bitten, twice shy. The snow panic began shortly after the announcement. I went out to do my normal grocery shopping today and every store was full. Even my local Aldi which only recently began keeping Sunday hours was full. It seems my secret weapon for last minute Sunday shopping is no longer a secret. Everyone and their grandmother was shopping today as if the only way to survive the upcoming snowfall is to have blueberry pop tarts on hand (only frosted will do).
No one understands how Cincinnati reacts to snow better than internationally acclaimed local cartoonist Jim Borgman. His blog is absolutely wonderful and this entry at his site entitled "The White Death: A Portfolio" gives a picture perfect view of what snow in Cincy is all about.
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Reference: BorgBlog: The White Death: a portfolio
It was that way when we lived in Portland. If there was even the merest chance of snow, it because "Winter Storm 2000whatever" and the tv went to all weather all the time. People would pack into the stores buying enough food to last about 6 years, schools and businesses would shut down, and the world would end. A few years ago, we got 6 inches of snow there and school was closed for a week the day after the kids went back from winter break. I would never drive in the snow there, even though I grew up in Montana, because Portlanders couldn't drive in the snow if their lives depended on it. There was no way I was going out on the roads with them.
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