Pluggers by Rick McKee for January 13, 2023

Arctic vortex versus the pineapple express.

Yeah, I don’t have any recollection of snowstorms having alphabetic names (Alexandra, Brenda, Charlotte… Xanthippe, Yasmin, Zoe) like hurricanes do.

Yeah i thought only hurricanes were named.

I think it’s just The Weather Channel that names snow storms.

And being from North & South Dakota, a blizzard, etc. was just another winter activity. We didn’t need to panic and live in fear… We would just ride it out, shovel out and get on with life. some were harder than others – and others were hurtful, especially to those not prepared. But the outdoor silence (when the wind wasn’t blowing) was deafeningly silent – a wonderful experience. We certainly don’t need these fear mongering media kings coming into our woods and prairie telling us to be fearful. Stay in Ohio – or in the NE or wherever y’all like the government to take care of you – Us in the prairie all know how to work together. Plus we have a decent government and governor, at least in SD, anyway.But… don’t get any ideas. We don’t need or want more people to move here… especially with you bringing your fears and politics and wokeness. Stay away!

Major blizzards and rainstorms used to be named by the year in which they occurred. When multiple such storms take place in a single year, an expanded designation might be needed, either alphabetical or numerical. The news media will figure something out, no doubt.

Also remember when Computer programs were called programs not Apps ….

Whoa! Wait a minute there, fella. Winter Storm? St. Augustine beach? A cold front is moving through St. Augustine right now as I’m typing this. It’s 59 degrees. In some places up north that would be considered a summer shower.

Whatever happened to just plain weather?

Now all full moons have names.

I find it amusing that the idea for today ‘statement’ comes from a gentleman in St. Augustine Beach, Florida—one about snowstorms no less ! ! ! !

My wife worries enough about severe weather for both of us. So far, she has never talked me into going down to the basement based on TV reporting. I tell her when the roof blows off, I’ll be right down, or she can find me one neighborhood over.

And the news channels rarely send their people out to the west-center and mid-west states like Wyoming, Montana, North and South Dakota to cover the storms/blizzaeds. Not enough people and the cattle and sheep herds don’t count as being important, being caught out in the fields. (Not being at USC, I can say the word).

I guess snow storms are bigger and worthier of names now. We are on the fringe, sometimes missed by the heaviest but when we get hit, shuts everything down for a few days. Not an issue really (yet), just takes longer and more tools to shovel out.

Winter storm naming in the US has been done sporadically since the mid-1700s, using dates, places, things [e.g., Schoolhouse Blizzard (1888), Great Snow of 1717, Halloween blizzard (1976), Mataafa Storm (1905, after a steamship)]. However, most if not all of these names came after the storm, not before or during the storm.

In the 2010s, The Weather Channel came up a list of names for winter storms similar to the official scheme used for hurricanes. Other media outlets then started coming up with their own naming lists. But there is no official naming scheme. The United States National Weather Service does not name winter storms. And most research meteorologists argue that because winter storms can reform more than once, naming them is confusing and redundant.

It’s kind of like a Snow Job – where they don’t mention the word snow (at least not in the headlines).

This was before local TV news departments decided they had to compete with cable to grab eyeballs with weather porn.

and some local TV stations give them their own series of names. National weather service already named them, lets not confuse things

i wonder when these snowstorms are gonna start having gender identity issues.

…and the local TV channels didn’t go out and drive around in an inch of snow with a selfie-cam.

“Skeery”? I bet the people in California and Selma (AL) were skeered, yesterday.

Ahh.. the good old days when all you worried about in winter was keeping a path open to the woodshed and the outhouse

Unfortunately, most of today’s Weather Reports are overly dramatic, sensational, and more often than not way over the top on the predictions. Thunderstorms suddenly become ‘dangerous Tornado watches and warnings… etc. I have basically gone back to relying on Grandfather’s ‘watch the sky and winds’ method of weather prediction.

Back in the day when monster storms weren’t so common, they’d be remembered by the year they happened (“the blizzard of ’93”). Now they need names to distinguish all those “storms of the century” that come one after the other in a single season…

Poor babies.

Much easier when big storms are named. Easier to know what hurricane Sandy is than something like “the 19th hurricane of 2012”. Though they do call it “superstorm Sandy” rather than hurricane due to all that went on.

Similarly I might not remember the 4th hurricane of 1960, but I sure do remember Hurricane Donna – I was only 7 and hit us badly here (not as bad as Sandy) and was my first experience with a hurricane. I lost a lot of my toys as they were in the basement and it flooded.

Several toys lost in Donna I had replaced and same along with the rest of what accumulated in the basement afterwards was all lost in Sandy – including the furnace.washer and dryer. My mom was living alone by then as dad had died and we were all married. Husband and I went over to the house to check on her as she decided to return rather quickly to the house afterwards. When we looked down the stairs into the water in the basement and saw things floating in it I had instant recall of looking at my toys floating when we looked downstairs the same way after Donna and I saw my toys floating past.

But to remember which hurricane by number instead of name – would not work as well.