Tuesday is usually go into town day, but the town plow has not been out, and no one is going anywhere until the roads are somewhat cleared. The snow is around 15″ deep, very wet and heavy. It’s windy, too, supposed to be 30mph winds tomorrow. The photos are of bits of the two deck pines, one in front, one to the side. Click for full size.
© C. Ford.
Beautiful.
From experience, Japan and Virginia, I’ve learned that snow is wondrous stuff in short doses of perhaps half an hour. After that it’s cold, wet, miserable. Until you get warm enough and the sun strikes the stuff just right … and its a wondrous experience, for about thirty minutes.
Right now, here, it’s about 78 … make that 80F according to the thermometer outside my open window. The hawk (Cooper’s) is making noise. My neighbor is out in her bootie shorts and bikini top. Young and beautiful, she is a wonder to behold. She is out admiring the hawk. There is beauty all around us. I’ll take mine warm.
Lorn:
I agree. I wouldn’t mind it so much if it wasn’t accompanied by serious cold. We’re in desperate need of the water though. The snowfall has been damn near non-existent for the last few winters, and come Spring, no snow melt, and a water table with little water in it.
It seems you have a lot of weather in ND. Here, it’s above freezing point again and some rain to come, probably melting all the snow before eventually going back to frost. Might be a bit slippery.
In the penultimate photo the snow looks clearly wet snow, coarse grained and ready to make your clothes wet.
lorn @ 1
In more Arctic and less maritime places the snow can be pleasantly “dry” and fluffy for extended periods. The South Coast of Finland is and isn’t such a place, depending on the year. In the winter here, it tends to be: overcast => warmer and clear skies => colder. For all the downsides of snow (I’ve got urban privilege), I’ll take them to get decent daylight for the few hours it’s possible at this time of the year (today, sunrise was 8:53 and sunset 15:24 [yes, a bit before 9 am and half past 3 pm]).
Yes, we have weather. The snow is very wet, can’t make a move outside without getting a bit soaked. I agree with you on sun, it gets to be in short supply here, too. Not quite as dire, but you have days like today where the skies are a pale gray, and what little light there is, mostly amplified by the snow. The sun is late coming up, and it disappears way too early, we’re probably somewhere in the sunrise around 7:45/8:00 am, and sunset around 4:30 pm. You get to wanting sun more than anything else.
While I’m thankful for the water, I wish it didn’t have to come in such an obnoxious form. Takes a herculean effort just to clear one inch off the sidewalk. Or more appropriately sisyphean, since I’ll be doing the same thing tomorrow.
Mark @ 5:
You and me both! Even a snow blower is a ton of work with this kind of snow, gad, it clings to *everything*. Our chain link fence is almost solid white. It was a mistake this morning, thinking my ankle boots would be good enough. I got nice and wet.
Caine @ 6
This is my first winter using a snowblower and it felt like it didn’t do a damn thing to save me time. I’m sure inexperience is a factor, but this snow is so wet I might as well have just gone with the shovel from the beginning.
Mark @ 7:
It really isn’t though, this kind of snow is snow from hell, so to speak. It’s so wet, and so dense, all it does to a snow blower is plug it up. You can barely get it off a shovel! It has unbelievable sticking power. We had ferocious winds today, and I watched the winds whipping the branches of the big pines, and all that snow? Just sat there.
Damn, Ice Swimmer, I only have a half hour more daylight than you!
I like snow, I hate clearing it, and clearing the wet, heavy stuff is the worst. It always looks easy, since it’s never a particularly thick layer (not like 30 cm of the fluffy stuff!). But, alas… The only thing worse is fluffy snow that has been packed down, scraping that off before it turns into the slippiest nonicerink is a whole different kind of pain.
But I do like snow, I like a lot of it, and I like it when it’s extremely cold. And it makes things lighter, considering the short daylight hours -- it really does a lot to brighten up the outdoors.
We are now having a wee bit of fluffy albino brain chiggers.
Very picturesque.
On another appendage, temperature is going down to -20°C by Monday.
I only like snow when it is freezing and I am looking at it from inside of well heated house.
I found it is actually more difficult to keep the house warm when the winter is wet and soggy, with wet snow and mists and rain. Even outside it is easier to keep warm when it is slightly freezing and not just sligtly above freezing.
One of my colleagues is from Minnesota. Two years ago he complained about winters in Germany. Along the lines -- “we got freezing winters in Minesotta, with tons of snow, but at least the sun is shining a lot and that helps to keep the spirits up. Here in Germany (Kaiserslautern to be precise) it does not freeze, there is no snow to speak of and it is permanently overcast, and that is depressing”.
I agree with that sentiment. Where I live we had about 8 hours of sunshine last winter, making the theoretical length of day at this altitude irrelevant. I hate winters.
Charly
I’ve also found temperatures between about -5 and +5 to be the worst, due to the moisture in the air (esp. if it’s windy!!!). The air itself isn’t particularly cold, but it’s so humid, it sucks the heat right out of your bones! Our house gets confused about it, too.