A question for those whom have never known snow...

hee hee... would you hate me if I told you I was watching it snow right now?

I once sat next to a woman from Hawaii at a conference who had never seen it snowing. She said to me, "I should be paying attention to the lecture but I've never seen it snow..." I assured her she was doing the right thing.

Here, winter seems to be annoying to me as it's this little fucking-freezing bit of weeks before it's short-sleeved weather again. If I have enough time to settle into my mittens it's not so bad.

like the time i was snowed in for four days... was unfun.

-- J-rock (juice_rock...), December 1st, 2004.

The wrong-est.

I've lived in snow and cold like you read about. MN --> NH --> CO --> MN --> CO

Still love it. The only that drags is the length (x-post). And, really, the more snow you get the warmer it is.... Minnepop (and NE and Boston) don't get snow so much as they get ice and bitter-kill-you cold.

Trump card: In junior high I had to go to school when it was -90 F (w/wind chill). They closed school the next day just because the collective ire of the Parents was so destructive.

The harshness of a winter is relative to each person based on what they've been accustomed to. A 60 degree day now would feel warm, in June, cold. Same thing.

Isn't it, though? So pretty as it falls. It's starting to stick, too... 2 to 4 inches by morning.

I kind of realized that to those with little snow experience; snow = lovely & picturesque, something to appreciate for its beauty.
But to those who(m) have become accustomed it and what it brings; snow = chaos & pain, something to fear!

we all suck and are bitches.

For me, heat will always trump cold because in few parts of the country does heat hurt. Sure, you can suffer heat stroke and heat exhaustion, but rarely by just standing around, and even in hot parts of the country those aren't usual risks for a typical summer day. Waiting for the bus in sub-zero weather, bundled up like that kid from A Christmas Story, and still in pain because of how cold the air is when I inhale? Dud. But that's just the "I hate being covered in sweat after walking to the mailbox" analogue; ultimately there is not much objective to say about weather except to note that it happens.

We had quite a good snowfall about three years ago, really thick and heavy and the best I've seen in my lifetime.

Last year Kev and I went 'snowchasing' and ended up in a carpark in Aberfoyle doing handbrake turns in the two inches of snow. We were only about thirty miles from home but even as we drove back towards Glasgow the snow was disappearing.

How do you make snow cream?

Give it a blow-job fnar fnar.

I don't think I could live without snow. Like rain, the sea, wind etc. It's good that I live in Scotland.

It's both to me. Sometimes simultaneously.

I'm with Tep re: The Heat vs. The Cold. In addition to what he said, The Cold is more soul-destroying than heat. Heat makes you lazy and tired and sweaty. Cold makes you want to kick God in the balls with cleats. I don't know how it is elsewhere, but here it's cloudy 4 out of 5 days in the winter. That coupled with The Cold makes one miserable. In Phoenix in July, the heat is oppressive but at least it's sunny. Sunshine does me good. I spent a good deal of time in Phoenix during the summer months, helped my sister move when it was 113F. It did suck, but not as much as the time I helped her move back to Chicago and it took me half an hour to get the lock off the back of the truck because it was frozen. In a Phoenix summer, the night provides a bit of a respite. Still hot, but you could go for a hike or a stroll without too much discomfort. In a Chicago winter, it's cold as fuck during the day, and EVEN COLDER at night. Fuck this shit.

but doesn't being angry have more soul than being lazy??

(but yes of course if you did manage to kick god's balls, he'd damn well really destroy your soul)

my power is back on. Just boiled up a bunch of water, but it sounds like the water treatment plants are back online, so hopefully the boil notice won't last long.

My main concern at the moment is that a pipe in the bathroom seems to be leaking, which caused a bunch of water to go into the adjacent closet. I'm doing what I can to dry out the carpet in the closet and not using the bathroom at this point. The water doesn't seem to be spreading beyond that, so it isn't clear how severe this is, but I'm at a loss for what else I can do to deal with it. As far as I can tell, no plumber is going to be available any time soon, and shutting off the water line seems like overkill.

if there's a leak you can't stop, I'd turn off your water line. even a small leak will cause major havoc if you let it go for a couple days.

the issue is that leaves me with no water indefinitely

as best as I can tell, no plumber is showing up until some time in March

yeah, no good choices... that sucks.

I obviously have no idea how your place it laid out Moodles, but any chance there is a shutoff just for that bathroom? Some houses have branch lines that can be turned off to isolate a bathroom without shutting down service for the whole place. But that's not the case everywhere and it might inaccessible, just a suggestion. If you can possible visually trace the line anywhere, you might find another shut off point.

read this as "sorrow" at first, and was really intrigued to see if anyone would identify as not having known sorrow

unfortunately there isn't anything obviously visible

Sorry, just a hopeful thought.

Water pipes on the exterior of buildings boggles my mind, and I live only one state over.

An Australian relative was telling me once how he was trying to figure out something with his pipes because they were on the west side of his house and his water got hot in the afternoons. I was all WHAT.

I don't know how water gets to my upstairs toilet – maybe some sort of paternoster system – but I know at least that it's not snaking up the side of my house.

Within the exterior walls, not actually on the outside of the wall. It usually doesn't get cold enough here for those "exterior" pipes to freeze, because you've still got the house's heating system overcoming the mild cold outside. This week we had a fatal combination of extended freezing temps far below what we usually see plus widespread power outages.

(also many homes here have electric heating only, no gas or oil except for maybe water heaters)

shutoff for the bathroom could be in the basement. i would call a plumber to see if they can tell you where it might be even if they can't come out right now. could save you a lot of trouble and $ in the future. like your bathtub falling through the ceiling as in breaking bad!

we don't have basements here! as f. hazel was saying, I believe the tub that is against the exterior wall is the culprit.

I've had frozen pipes in Georgia and Oregon and both times the problem was a pipe within an exterior, noninsulated wall

I worked on a gut and remodel of a Craftsman-style bungalow, when we got to tearing off the exterior walls, the insulation was torn up newspaper from the '20s.

Tons of houses like that in Houston and Dallas - in the Sun Belt boom areas, the situation is less dire with houses built later.

Yeah my house growing up in AU had external pipes, or at least exposed and in the garage.

Even we once had blocked pipes due to a freezing winter (about -10C). But only the once.

...and we're back to sunny and highs in the upper 60s. it's beautiful outside, which belies how deeply traumatized people are.

only a 60 degree shift in less than a week, no biggie. It is very strange how it's just gone, but there's a lot left to do to get back to fully functioning.

I think the rapid shifts increase the psychological weight - it happens every lesser winter storm, everyone is dazed for a few days because it so quickly ramps back into being nice. This time I'm seeing so many people with a thousand yard stare.

Yeah, and after a year of COVID a lot of people went into this with not much left in the tank. And having your own home turn into hostile territory after months of being your sole refuge just breaks your brain.

I checked my receipts, and it looks like I started planning for this on the 7th, I bought a bunch of firewood and placed a big HEB curbside order for the 10th. At the time it seemed like overkill, now I'm glad I did it since I ended up hosting a guest for four days. My hands are still all torn to shit from digging in the ice for water shutoff valves.

And this was a statewide disaster event, unlike a hurricane, which just pounds the coastal areas but generally falls apart into rain and minor wind incidents by the time they get to Austin or DFW.