: The way that people freak the fuck out over snow anymore. Somewhere in the last 20 years, something has changed so that at this point every goddamn snowfall of more than 3" warrants a small panic, everything larger than 6" warrants a big panic, and everything that's a foot or more is OMGSNOWMAGEDDON!!!1! My son's school regularly institutes two hour delays because it is "cold" (e.g. below ~20) at the bus stop or because there's an inch or so of snow that fell overnight. Today they are closed because of the
anticipated snow - which could be a whopping 2"-6" by the end of the day. This is in rural PA, and this is nonsense.
As some of you know, I live in a place that's fairly remote and I have a half mile long driveway with farm fields on either side of it...the driveway sometimes gets drifts in places that are in excess of 2-3' high and when I get plowed out it has to be done with a farm tractor (pickup trucks don't cut it). The snow piled on either side of my driveway afterward has been well over 8-10' before. I sometimes get stranded for a couple of days until the plow gets here. I had pipes freeze and break last winter, costing a fair amount to replace. I had the heating oil delivery truck get stuck in my driveway last year and need a giant ass tow truck to pull it out. I KNOW how shitty winter can be and it is by far my least favorite season and there are conditions in which it certainly makes sense to grumble and complain a bit about things and adjust your living habits ---- but not for piddling amounts of snow and certainly not for the
threat of snow or cold.
Here comes the uber "grumpy old man" part: When I was a kid, also growing up in rural PA, this shit did not happen. We went to school in pretty much anything under six inches, only having delays when there was snow falling at the time when buses would be on the road or if it was too cold for salt to melt black ice and the like. Buses would take longer to get to school sometimes, and occasionally one would go off the road...but those kids were lucky because they got to have an adventure instead of sitting in class! When they got to school, they were instant celebrities with tales to tell of tow trucks, bus driver cursing, and adolescent impropriety in the ditch. When I was in college in Syracuse, NY where
more snow falls than almost any other college in the country, they canceled classes for snow only ONCE in my six years there...and that was the first time they had done so in like 15-20 years or something. I once drove home across three states for Christmas in the worst storm of the season because my grandfather was in poor health (it turned out to be his last). I seem to recall that people just drove more carefully, always made sure they were stocked up and ready for a heavy snow if it came, etc. Life went on and the panic that seems to grip everyone these days was absent.
A big portion of this is, of course, the media. The Weather Channel fucking gives names to its snowstorms now like they are goddamn hurricanes, presumably because it helps the ratings by boosting the paranoia and fear. Good Morning America this morning was showing video of a few cars off the road in Ohio as a way to "warn" those of us in the Northeast about what is imminent, as if everyone here has no idea that there's danger of driving into a ditch if you aren't careful in a snowstorm. They keep playing the clip of DeBlasio warning about
The Day After Tomorrow IRL without noting that hyperbole is the forte of all politicians, and especially those from NYC.
This same nonsensical fear and paranoia translates to other seasons too, of course, and every weather anomaly is now an EVENT for the 24 hour news cycle...but winter retains the worst of this fear-mongering. It just irritates the piss out of me (obviously) and I wish people would rediscover their collective 'nads when it comes to dealing with the weather. Suck it up, quit moaning, and accept that if you live in Chicago it will be fucking windy, that Phoenix is insanely hot in the summer, that you won't see the sun much in Seattle, and that if you live between West Virgina and Maine you'll regularly have cold winters with lots of snow.
: Snow can be fun! Yesterday we hooked a long rope up to the back of the truck and my wife, son, and I took turns riding in the sled behind the truck up and down the driveway. 10-15MPH in a sled feels like a fucking roller coaster and it was a blast
