Optimist, Pessimist, or Realist?

[gerisullivan]

It's May 30th.

I just took the snow brush out of my car until next winter.


Additional information that may or may not be pertinent and/or useful:

-- Three weeks ago today, I removed the coal shovel that's so useful when one needs to dig one's car out of a snowbank, especially the snowbanks along the edge of one's driveway that a certain driver has been known to get stuck in...repeatedly...when backing down for a second or third attempt at getting up the curved slope.

-- There are at least three ice scrapers still in the car. They don't take up any space needed for other things and live there year round. Why three? It makes it much more likely that one will be found when it's needed.

-- I've lived in Massachusetts for five years and two weeks.

-- It is entirely possible that those 25 years in Minnesota are still in my bloodstream.

Comments

[kalimac.livejournal.com]

It is entirely possible that those 25 years in Minnesota are still in my bloodstream.

How differs Massachusetts snow from Minnesota snow? Knowing little of either - my experience living with Ohio snow predates having to drive in it - I am curious.

[gerisullivan.livejournal.com]

Minnesota's winter tends to start and end 2-3 weeks later than Massachusetts winter, maybe even a month. Both states tend to be visited by big snowstorms in March. That leaves one distrustful of the first signs of spring in both states, but the last time there was enough snow to plow here at Toad Woods this year was on March 2nd.

Minnesota's lowest temperatures are 20-25 degrees colder than those in Massachusetts. That means when snow falls in Minnesota, it tends to stay for the rest of the season. Massachusetts has the kind of freeze-thaw cycle you probably noticed in Ohio. We certainly had it in southern Michigan. Weather patterns have been changing enough that even Minnesota is getting more freeze-thaw than it did during the first decade I lived there.

In Minnesota, the year 29 inches of snow fell in a freak Halloween blizzard, the snow was there to stay, even though we often celebrated Thanksgiving having received nothing more than light flurries to that date. It was a horrible winter. Long. Long. Long.

About 10 years later, a Nor'easter buried the eastern seaboard in snow the first weekend of December, five weeks further into winter than Minnesota's Halloween storm. The Boston area had 30-36" snow on the ground before the storm ended. More snow, further into the season. I sold Toad Hall on December 30th and flew east, going up to Massachusetts to celebrate New Year's. A mere 24 days had passed...and all of the snow was gone save a few little mostly-melted mounds where the plows had piled it high in the process of clearing roads and parking lots. I was utterly shocked...and delighted. After 25 years in Minnesota, I had no idea that much snow could melt that fast in December. I knew from personal experience it wasn't up to the trick in November.

Massachusetts gets more ice. A lot more ice. It goes with that freeze-thaw cycle.

[kalimac.livejournal.com]

Wow. Illuminating. Thx.