Half an inch of panic

[RottingCorpse]

Tell your boss that Al Gore told me to slap him on the forehead with my cock.

[nacho]

Okay!

[nacho]

Snowstorm!  The city braces for our first big winter storm!

An inch is predicted tonight!  Turning into a wintry mix tomorrow.  Heavy precipitation! Maybe A TENTH OF AN INCH IN THE MORNING!!!

[nacho]

NPR's talking to a guy from upstate New York about their zillion feet of snow.  The girl labors the word 'snow' each time.

With that kind of snooow how are people's roofs holding out?

And more snooow on the way?

A hundred feet of snooow.........in upstate New York!

Uh...a salt truck just went by.  It hasn't started yet.  Won't start till midnight.  The sun's out. 

[fajwat]

either the npr or pacifica announcer was cautioning us about the dreaded "black ice" which.. honestly, they never seem to mention when these things are supposed to occur.  Just.... "Pirates!" and I'm not sure if it's historical or new, fictional or real.

[nacho]

"Pirates!"

haha!  No shit.

Black ice is one of those "daddy always said" things that has been adopted by the recent generation.  So, in the 80's, everyone's parents complained about black ice, warned the fuck out of us when we went off to college in the early 90's, and now we're grown up and writing the news.  Black ice!  For our parents, it was the communists.  Which is why the "evil empire" routine worked so fucking well.  For us, it's dangerous weather conditions.

And, of course, it has the same theme as the evil empire days.  The great and terrible evil empire was a bankrupt, starving Russia on her death bed.  Black ice -- just as menacing.

Alternatively, it might be a government-wide effort to constantly remind us because they know we're all drugged to the gills on feel-happy drugs, carrying on three conversations with 14 cell phones and driving at 70 MPH with our lights off the wrong way down the Interstate.

[fajwat]

Hey, tomorrow I'll only have five cell phones (on four networks), and only three of them (on two networks) active.  And I forgot this morning's happy pills!  I'm behind the curve!!!!!

I just (re?)read your FPA, A Convenient Truth -- dangerous cold weather is being negated by luxury and sloth.  Yay! 

[nacho]

Yeah... I don't remember writing that. But I agree with it.  Bring on the comfortably warm weather apocalypse!

[RottingCorpse]

Alternatively, it might be a government-wide effort to constantly remind us because they know we're all drugged to the gills on feel-happy drugs, carrying on three conversations with 14 cell phones and driving at 70 MPH with our lights off the wrong way down the Interstate.

I think you might have something here.

[nacho]

Oh no!!!!

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/02/12/AR2007021200496.html

Winter Storm Expected to Hit Region
Mix of Rain and Sleet Could Coat Roads With Ice by Wednesday

A winter storm taking shape today across the Midwestern plains will tickle the Washington area with snow tonight before giving way to a mixture of freezing rain and sleet

We'll be TICKLED!!!

But with surface temperatures expected to stay below freezing, the storm could coat roads with a slick layer of ice

Ice!  SLICK ICE!!

The threat exists, according to Accu-Weather meteorologist John Gresiak, of an ice storm intense enough to bring down power lines in some areas

Quick!  To the bunker!

[RottingCorpse]

I'm loading up essentials and heading for the coast!

[nacho]

You won't make it before the slick ice gets you!

[RottingCorpse]

As long as there are no human hosts, the slick ice can't incubate.

[nacho]

Heh..

Marc Fisher from the Post:

HysteriaWatch: The Countdown Continues
Snow morphs into ice. The hysteria over this week's storm is diminishing as the forecasted snow totals plummet. But the likelihood of Washington's favorite winter scenario--the lovely wintry mix--is rising, and that brings us an entirely different kind of Snow Hysteria, with intimations of power outages and cars slip-sliding all over the region's roads.

HysteriaWatch continues with overall lower ratings today:

What Channel 9 yesterday called "The Big One" "now looks like a wintry mess," the station's forecasters write. "We're likely to see a light dusting to a few inches of snow by Tuesday morning before the snow changes over to sleet and freezing rain." Now that doesn't sound quite so dramatic, right? So Channel 9's Hysteria Rating drops all the way down from a 6 to a 3.

Over at Channel 7, forecaster Brian van de Graaf nicely combines a measured tone with some urgency and a bit of humor: "Enjoy this calm before the storm, because whatever the form this next system takes it will be a messy and troublesome one. Have a great day." Hysteria Rating: 2.

But WTOP radio uses the info from Channel 7 to paint a more dire picture: "Forecasters say it will be 'everything and the kitchen sink,'" the station's home page says. The story goes on to quote 7's van de Graaf saying that "Even a four-wheel drive is not going to cut through the ice." Hysteria Rating: 5.

At CapitalWeather.com, Jason Samenow is venturing some specific guesses, saying there's a 40 percent chance of accumulation of less than two inches, a far cry from the "big one" we heard about elsewhere over the weekend. In fact, Jason dares to say what the commercial TV forecasters so rarely admit: "Could it fizzle out? Yes -- especially from the perspective of those who want snow. Models have been trending warmer and warmer in the layer of the atmosphere where it's required to be cold for it to snow. So snow amounts could be quite modest."

Tony Perkins on Channel 5 takes a cautious and quite funny approach, predicting "some problems" from freezing rain and laces his forecast with all sorts of warnings, including "void where prohibited" and "your mileage may vary." Hysteria Rating: Zilch.

Channel 4 wins the high rating on the generally modest HysteriaMeter today, with lots of talk about "the biggest winter storm of the season" and a forecast of up to eight inches of snow: weatherman Tom "Kierein said the storm system could dump as much as 4 inches of snow in the District, and as much as 8 inches north and west of the city." Hysteria Rating: 6.

Here on the big website, the Post's Howard Schneider takes a gentler approach, writing that the storm is likely to "tickle the Washington area with snow tonight before giving way to a mixture of freezing rain and sleet that is expected to intensify by Tuesday afternoon and continue through tomorrow evening. Only light accumulations are expected...."

What's really going to happen? Not a whole heck of a lot, according to the National Weather Service:


Tuesday: New ice accumulation of around a 0.1 of an inch possible. New snow accumulation of less than a half inch possible. Tuesday Night: Periods of freezing rain. New precipitation amounts between three quarters and one inch possible.

Yep, less than an inch. Hoo-eeee! But never fear: The HysteriaWatch never stops.

[RottingCorpse]

"I think I cut off his arm in time before the black ice had a chance to spread!"