You know it's bad outside when...

[gerisullivan]

...the short version of this afternoon's Accuweather forecast includes these words:

"...ice accumulations may cause power outages."

Oh, joy.

More of that noisy freezing rain stuff has been falling from the sky. No cracking tree branches yet, unless they're SPDs. My sixty-four thousand dollar question du jour is whether or not to go out and remove the lake of slush covering the concrete apron and bottom part of my driveway.

If I do, the rest of the freezing rain that falls today may well turn into thick glare ice that's all but impossible to remove until the temperature warms up again and the ice melts.

If I don't and the slush lake freezes hard while the freezing rain continues falling and the temperature drops, the driveway lake ice will be thick enough to supporting a fishing shack until spring.

Okay, maybe not until spring....

There's likely to be a period of some unknown number of hours after the freezing rain is through falling and before the slush freezes rock hard. Whether or not I'll notice when that is and remove the slush in time is problematic at best.

At least I'm not trying to drive in this. And the power is still on and steady. (Knocking wood....)

Yes, I live here. By choice and All That Jazz....

Comments

[galtine1.livejournal.com]

Anything wrong with tossing a metric tonne of rock salt in there? Something to help keep it either chewy or chunky so that when the time comes you have 1k gallons of margarita starter (just add lime and tequilla) for slurpy or rocks versions?

[intelligentrix.livejournal.com]

Ha! Great minds and all that...

[intelligentrix.livejournal.com]

What about pro-actively salting the slush lake? It might prevent a hard freeze.

[timill]

Throw kitty litter on the slush as it's freezing?

[smofbabe.livejournal.com]

Just don't try to make any snow angels :->

[timill]

...because that could get expensive.

[smofbabe.livejournal.com]

She tried it once at a Boskone in Framingham. It looked very painful...

[debgeisler.livejournal.com]

One makes "snow angels" in snow, not semi-frozen slush. Yech. And *brrrrrr*.

[gerisullivan.livejournal.com]

Exactly. You nailed it, 4 for 4.

[cogitationitis.livejournal.com]

Generally, if it's snow going to slush to rain, it's a good idea to remove the snow before the slush comes, if possible, and try to keep up with the slush. Then the rain will wash away the rest of the ice. In the morning, you'll have some wicked black ice, true, but it'll go away when teh sun comes out.

[gerisullivan.livejournal.com]

All true, but I think that was your weather. It certainly wasn't mine. The snow on the ground fell a week ago; the walks, drives, and roadways were long since cleared. So there wasn't any snow. There was a layer of ice, then a layer of slush and ice pellets, then more cold and ice, and no rain to wash anything away here. Only freezing rain that iced everything more and more as the day progressed.

From what I can tell from the news, Wales was in its usual cold pocket and nearby areas were bad but nowhere near as ice-encased as I am.