Welcome to Buffalo, NY

The news, this morning, was showing some areas which had already received about 7 feet of lake effect snow...and it was still snowing. This November has been a real shock to most of the nation, and records are being broken almost daily in some parts of the nation. Around here, a foot of snow brings things to a halt for a couple of days...I can't imagine 6 or 7 feet of that stuff all at one time. On top of this massive snowfall, the forecast is saying that warmer temperatures in coming days will cause a lot of this to melt, and bring a real possibility of flooding to parts of New York, etc. The people in those areas are in for a rough time.
 
This is exactly why I moved to Florida from Michigan 37 years ago. When my northern friends ask me how I can stand "all that heat and humidity", my answer is that I've never in the past 37 years shoveled three feet of heat and humidity off my sidewalk, I've never had to scrape an inch of heat and humidity off my windshield so I can see where I'm driving, I've never skidded on a sheet of heat and humidity and plowed into the back of a bus, and I've sure never slipped on a sidewalk covered with heat and humidity and busted my tailbone.
 
jujube said:
This is exactly why I moved to Florida from Michigan 37 years ago. When my northern friends ask me how I can stand "all that heat and humidity", my answer is that I've never in the past 37 years shoveled three feet of heat and humidity off my sidewalk, I've never had to scrape an inch of heat and humidity off my windshield so I can see where I'm driving, I've never skidded on a sheet of heat and humidity and plowed into the back of a bus, and I've sure never slipped on a sidewalk covered with heat and humidity and busted my tailbone.
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Back in 1990 I moved from Michigan to TN to escape the winters. East TN had all the seasons but winter was often mild, although there was a blizzard or two but no constant snow.

Rarely get snow in my area of Scotland and it's still in the low 50's. But it does get very windy with cold rain in the winter.
 
Our last house was out on a country road and sat in the wide open. The snow would drift so fast,by the time I got to bottom of my driveway, it had filled in again. I did finally put up a snow fence and it did help a little. Got so disgusted, I hired to have it plowed by truck.
 
January 1977, I fell on a construction site and shattered a leg. Was in the hospital 31 days as they worked to get it put back together. (With today's orthopedic technology, probably would have been out in 3 days!) Watched THE blizzard of '77 as Buffalo was buried in snow, on the television in my hospital room. Was amazed, then. Even more amazed, now, as this seems even worse.
 
Grumpy Ol' Man said:
January 1977, I fell on a construction site and shattered a leg. Was in the hospital 31 days as they worked to get it put back together. (With today's orthopedic technology, probably would have been out in 3 days!) Watched THE blizzard of '77 as Buffalo was buried in snow, on the television in my hospital room. Was amazed, then. Even more amazed, now, as this seems even worse.
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Hope that leg isn't giving you too much trouble today Grumpy Ol' Man...sounds like a bad break! Here's more on the '77 blizzard...

 
This evening, the news is saying that some areas had over 5 and 1/2 feet of snow, with another 2 to 3 feet possible through Thursday. This will certainly be among the top 5 worst storms to hit that region.
 
Thanks, SeaBreeze. The only lingering effect was... WAS a bad knee, complete with three stainless steel screws. 2009, modern medical technology sawed that old knee out and epoxied a new knee in. End of problem!!! (I told the doc, going into surgery, that I had carried those screws for many a year and wanted to keep them. I was kidding. Upon waking from surgery, my wife said "The doc stopped by with this." It was a small plastic container with the three screws in it!!!
 
Virtually NO area is equipped to handle this kind of a snowfall. Anything over a foot generally brings most areas to a standstill for several hours....even days. This morning, the news is reporting that gas stations are out of fuel, and road crews are standing down because of the inability to find gas/diesel for their plows and trucks. No matter how "advanced" we think we are, Mother Nature Always has the means to humble our best efforts.
 
On our news it said you are in for a rapid thaw..which will bring more problems due to to the magnitude of water from the melting snow..then it will rain..and then freeze again..
 
Grumpy Ol' Man said:
Thanks, SeaBreeze. The only lingering effect was... WAS a bad knee, complete with three stainless steel screws. 2009, modern medical technology sawed that old knee out and epoxied a new knee in. End of problem!!! (I told the doc, going into surgery, that I had carried those screws for many a year and wanted to keep them. I was kidding. Upon waking from surgery, my wife said "The doc stopped by with this." It was a small plastic container with the three screws in it!!!
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Good news Grumpy! Glad to hear you are on the mend! :)
 
When we lived in Michigan, we lived on a side street off a main artery, with the town police department at the end of the street. The snow plow would go by about four times a day, keeping the street clear, which was great for the street. However, it would just push the snow into the end of our driveway, so we'd had a heaped up pile of hard frozen snow in the morning to clean out before we could leave and there it would be again when we came home. That got old real fast!
 
I don't know who originally wrote this but I have to drag it out and dust it off every year:
A SOUTHERNER MOVES UP NORTH

JAN 10 5:00 PM. It's starting to snow. The first snow of the season and
the first one we've seen in years. The wife and I took our hot buttered
rums and sat by the picture window, watching the soft flakes drift down,
clinging to the trees and covering the ground. It was beautiful!

Jan 11 We awoke to a lovely blanket of crystal white covering the
landscape. What a fantastic sight. Every tree and shrub covered with a
beautiful white mantle. I shoveled snow for the first time in years, and
loved it. I did both our driveway and our sidewalk. Later a city
snowplow came along and accidentally covered up our driveway with
compacted snow from the street. The driver smiled and waved. I waved
back and shoveled it again.

Jan 12 It snowed an additional 5 inches last night and the temperature has
dropped to about 11 degrees. Several limbs on the trees and shrubs
snapped due to the weight of the snow. I shoveled our driveway again.
Shortly afterwards, the snowplow came by and did his trick again. Much of
the snow is now brownish-gray.

Jan 13 Warmed up enough during the day to create some slush which soon
became ice when the temperature dropped again. Bought snow tires for both
cars. Fell on my ass in the driveway. $145 to a chiropractor, but
nothing was broken. More snow and ice expected.

Jan 14 Still cold. Sold the wife's car and bought a 4x4 in order to get
to work. Slid into a guardrail anyway, and did considerable amounts of
damage to the right quarter panel. Had another 8 inches of the white sh*t
last night. Both vehicles covered in salt and crud. More shoveling in
store for me today. That damn snowplow came by twice today.

Jan 15 - 2 degrees outside. More f**kin' snow. Not a tree or shrub on our
property that hasn't been damaged. Power was off most of the night.
Tried to keep from freezing to death with candles and a kerosene heater,
which tipped over and nearly burned the house down. I managed to put the
flames out but suffered 2nd degree burns on my hands and lost all my
eyelashes and eyebrows. 4x4 slid on the ice on the way to the
emergency-room and was totaled.

Jan 16 Damn mother f**kin' white sh*t keeps coming down. Have to put
all the clothes on we own just to get to the f**kin' mailbox. If I ever
catch that son-of-a-bitch that drives the snowplow I'll chew open his
chest and rip out his heart. I think he hides around the corner and waits
to plow shut our driveway again. Power still off. Toilet froze and part
of the roof has started to cave in.

Jan 17 Six damn more f**kin' inches of f**kin' snow and f**kin'
sleet, f**kin' ice and goddamn knows what other kind of white f**kin'
sh*t fell last night. I wounded the f**kin' snowplow asshole with an ice
axe, but he got away. Wife left me. Car won't start. I think I'm going
snowblind. I can't move my toes. Haven't seen the sun in weeks. More
snow predicted. Wind Chill -22 f**kin' degrees. I'm moving back to
North Carolina!
 
Yup, that old story is always hilarious...especially this time of year. I've lived in a half dozen different states, including Colorado, over the years....and the biggest mess I've seen with snow and ice was in Goldsboro, NC., when I was stationed there with the USAF in 1966. They had about 7 or 8 inches one night, and it brought that area completely to its knees for over 2 days. They had virtually no snow removal equipment around that town, and the few drivers that ventured out quickly littered the road with their wrecks, and sliding off the road. The AF called everyone who lived off base, and told us all to just stay home until the roads got cleared.
 

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