humor

Still Snowing – one happy dog.

One happy dog.

Last nights snow has shut nearly everything down in Dublin, amounting to 6-8 inches with drifting in places. Hardly anyone is out, except myself and the dog, and he is one happy fella running about in the snow. He hasn’t stopped grinning since we went outside.

Panorama fresh snow this am.

Another view of the park.

There’s more due in the next few hours – you can see it on the far edges of the pictures – but for now, it’s bright, clear, pristine, and beautiful. Yes, it’s the morning after – and despite all the “don’t drive” warnings, the “travel chaos” alerts, the “we’re running out of water so we have to shut it off (more on that later)” worries – I can’t help but smile.

Sunny but cold. 12.22.2010

Why? Because winter is my favorite time of year – not because of Christmas, or New Years – because somehow, when it Snows, it’s easy to Believe in Magic.

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Better Late than Never…(at least according to the dog)

It finally started snowing. It’s the 21st of December, and only 6 days late – we’re finally seeing the start of the snowstorm of the epoch.

Finally, the weatber guy was right...
The problem is that it’s come on top of rain, so that means ice with snow on top. The other interesting point is that it’s sticky wet snow alternated by powder snow showers and lots of wind. It’s causing havoc (as you can see below) with driving (it’s almost horizontally snowing) – for all those last minute Christmas holiday shoppers headed up the M50 to the mall.

4th floor glass wall view of the M50

The amusing part of this is that not only is it 6 days late, half the office went home upon seeing the first few flakes. Oh, and they were a bit irritated with me, because I started singing all the “snow” related Christmas carols that I could possibly think of. The greatest hits included “Let it Snow”, “White Christmas”, “Frosty the Snowman”, and on my way out the door, a rousing rendition of “Walking in a Winterland”. I was called evil, told it was completely my fault (notice the wiggling fingers and the evil grin on my face as they said that and I laughed) and strange enough, I was the only one HAPPY about the snow. Well, except for my dog – who is always overjoyed when it Snows (even if it is 6 days later than the weatherman predicted).

*** UPDATE: 12/21/2010 9:15 pm ***

We’re up to about 5 inches of snow, and it’s coming down so hard you can hardly keep your eyes open. It’s impressive – as the last time I saw it snow this hard was when I was in Utah. I went out with the dog – and took a few snaps – the building below – is about 500 yards from where I’m standing – and you could barely see it through the snow.

Evening snow...

Oh – and after only 20 minutes, I was covered enough to where I resembled a yeti. This is about 10 minutes out with the pup.

Heavy snow, 12.21.2010

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Storm of the Epoch

Last Tuesday, I was reading a news article here in Dublin about how bad the weather was supposed to get this weekend. We’re in for a polar hurricane this weekend. It’s gonna be bad. So bad, in fact that it’s to be called the storm of the epoch. No really. I mean it. I’m not just pulling your leg…. I’m totally serious. It’s going to be travel chaos, once in a lifetime storm, and You can read the article here:

http://www.irishweatheronline.com/2010/12/severe-weather-alert-ireland-and-uk.html

The prize pieces of this article are the following:

“I can’t stress strongly enough that this will be a major winter weather onslaught and not just a drop in temperatures with a few local flurries.”

and

“When this polar hurricane develops…”

and

“All of these factors are building blocks towards what may become an epochal cold spell for Ireland and Britain in the next 20-30 day interval.”

Now, for those of you wondering, what exactly is an EPOCH?

According to the Geologic time scale – The largest defined unit of time is the supereon, composed of eons. Eons are divided into eras, which are in turn divided into periods, epochs and ages. The terms eonothem, erathem, system, series, and stage are used to refer to the layers of rock that correspond to these periods of geologic time.

An Epoch – more narrowly – is defined as tens of millions of years.

So, I am thinking “Day After Tomorrow” apocolypse type movie, and naturally planned for the worst. Made sure I had plenty of food, water, warm clothes in the house. I dug out my wool scarf, gloves, hat, and long johns (which weren’t put away very far since 2 weeks ago we had solid blocks of ice to skate to work on for a week) and put my heavy boots by the door. And I started waiting. and waiting. and waiting. and Guess what? I’m still waiting.

Wednesday night. Cold, clear, windy. -4 C.

Thursday night. Cold, a bit of mist, windy. -2C.

Friday night. Cold, flurries (didn’t even stick to most pavement), -3C.

Saturday night. Cold, clear, windy, -4C.

Sunday day. Cold, clear, sunny with blue skies and 2C (above freezing).

And the kicker? NO SNOW.
Not a bit. A hard frost – but the roads are fine, it’s not epochially cold. It’s not even a particularly memorable blizzard. Don’t believe me? Check out this picture – taken 5.minutes.ago.out.my.office.window…. by cell phone.

Dublin's Storm of the Epoch 2010

The storm of the epoch...2010.

Uh… Overkill much on that Dublin forecast folks? Where IS Robert Frost when I need him (Fire and Ice poem)?

(Ok granted, the storm went north and south of us, and they got lots of snow in the UK, but… I still don’t think that it qualified as “epoch” cold / blizzard conditions. Epoch? Really? Um.. The Ice Age.. now that was Epoch cold.)

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