Showing posts with label cold. Show all posts
Showing posts with label cold. Show all posts

Wednesday, January 30, 2019

Ice, ice, baby


Winter. Omaha. (sigh)

Well, at least it's pretty. Present temperature: 0º. Wind chill: -13º.

Saturday, February 08, 2014

No shelter at all


This was the view Friday of the homeless camp just off Omaha's Keystone Trail.

Sometimes, a crude shelter is no shelter at all -- no good against the cold and worthless in the snow. It looks like whoever was camped here is long gone . . . thankfully.


THE HIGH on Friday was 13. That was a big improvement over Thursday, which started out at 10 below.

If this is all the shelter you have, there's a word to describe you. That would be "dead."

Still, consider there are folks out there . . . in the cold. In rough camps not much better than this. It's what they call "home."

Ours is a society of cracks, through which "the least of these" fall, much like the snow through the gaps in this lean-to.


Lord, have mercy.

Frozen in time


When it's this cold, "frozen in time" isn't just 
another expression. Just so you know.

Saturday, December 28, 2013

Ch-ch-ch-ch-changes. Turn and face the strain.


It started out amazingly temperate for a late December day here in Omaha. We're talking upper 50s for a high.

It was 61 yesterday.  

And then this evening, the cold front. The wind is blowing hard; the temperature is falling fast. The optimistic forecast for Sunday is 13 for a high.
 
The one I believe says 10.

Anyway, I ventured out to play chicken with the Polar Express a bit ago, playing with my new Nikon digital SLR camera. I thought these pictures looked rather like the kind of night it's shaping up to be.  

I just may have to throw another log on the fire . . . and we don't even have a fireplace.

Monday, December 09, 2013

December dog sense


It's 10 degrees in Omaha right now, the ground is covered with snow, it's rather hazy and the wind chill is 1 below zero.

LONG STORY short, I think Molly the Dog has the right idea here.

Alas, I disturbed Her Royal Hunkered-In Highness, who no doubt wants Pop to go away -- and to take the annoying, clicking Rectangle of Death with him.

Her wish, etc., etc.

As you were, Mollster.

Thursday, December 20, 2012

A winter wonderland


A funny thing happened Wednesday evening here in Omaha, by God, Nebraska. Winter showed up.

And how.

Above is the long-exposure view of what the blizzard looked like at about 20 of 11 last night.

AND HERE, immediately above, is what it looked like when using a flash.
The following photos represent what it looked like today, after the storm was through and we'd had a chance to dig out from under the 7 or so inches of well-drifted snow. I think they speak for themselves, so I'll just shut up now.
Besides, I got water boiling on the stove, and I need to make me a pot of coffee.
























Wednesday, December 19, 2012

Blizzard warning

4:06 p.m. -- starting to snow hard

The more the forecasters keep forecasting, the higher the snow totals keep going in these parts.

When we started our day today in Omaha, we were expecting a winter storm. Maybe 6 inches of snow.

Sometime along the way, that turned into a blizzard warning, and now we might get up to 10 inches of hard-blowing snow which, come to think of it, sounds a little kinky the way I just put it. A little more than an hour ago, it was just raining.

Now it's not.

Good thing I'm an artiste with a snow shovel, which is a skill not every -- OK, almost no -- Louisiana boy possesses. Perhaps I'm a real Midwesterner now, after 24 years.

By the way, in the Gret Stet, what we know in Nebraska as a "blizzard warning" is commonly referred to as "instant frozen death." Not an understated lot, those Louisiana folk.

Film at 11.

Thursday, January 12, 2012

The return of winter


It took a while, but Nebraska in January is starting to look once again like Nebraska in January.

Hello, winter. I've been saving a blanket just in case.

Wednesday, November 02, 2011

Wednesday, February 09, 2011

The bosses of me


Scout the Dog (left) and Molly the Dog happily pose inside the semiwarm house Tuesday on a frigid, icy Omaha afternoon.

They tell me it beat going outside -- it was, like, 1 below zero at the time -- that it seemed to amuse me, and that they try to be indulgent toward their pets.
I can't speak for Mrs. Favog, but this pet is grateful for his masters' beneficence.

Tuesday, February 08, 2011

Baby, it's cold outside . . .


This weather can't last . . .

(But baby, it's cold outside)


It really can't stay . . .
(But baby, it's cold outside)

Got to go away . . .
(But baby, it's cold outside)

Last few days have been . . .
(Been hoping the heat'd kick in)

Nothin' but ice . . .
(Warm air would be so very nice)

My mother will start to worry . . .
(She probably froze in a hurry)

My father will be pacing the floor . . .
(He's such a hypothermic bore)

So really I'd better scurry . . .
(Beautiful. You'd die a death quite icy)

Well, maybe just half a drink more . . .
(Turn on the weather while I pour)

The neighbors might think . . .
(Baby, it's bad out there)

Say what's in this drink?
(I thought it was antifreeze)

I wish I knew how . . .
(Your eyes are frozen open now)

To break this Arctic spell . . .
(Here's a wool cap, it'll feel just swell)

I ought to say no no . . .
(Your chattering teeth are getting worser)

At least I'm going to say I tried . . .
(But, hey, your battery died!)

I really can't stay . . .
(Listen . . . you'd freeze, no doubt)

Baby it's cold outside
!

Monday, February 07, 2011

Note to the convention and visitors people


Dear Omaha Convention
and Visitors Bureau:

I love your website. You're right, there's plenty to do and see in our vibrant city -- people will love it here. They might decide to move here, even.

Just one thing, though. You need to get folks in the door.

While I think your website does a great job in that respect, there is one glaring oversight. See that "Omaha weather" thingy at the top right of the page? Get rid of it from October 1 through May 1.

"Hey, people, come to Omaha! Look! Right now, it's 2 DEGREES!!!"

In the PR and travel biz, I think that's known,
technically, as a "non-starter." Unless, of course, you're marketing our fine area exclusively to the fine citizens of Barrow, Alaska, and International Falls, Minn.

Love and kisses,

Me

Wednesday, February 02, 2011

The snow tree


Winter ain't bad, once you get used to it.

A philosopher or something once said that. My back may be up to posting an op-ed counterpoint on this subject . . . once the acetaminophen kicks in.

As red as the driven snow


It's a windy, snowy and frosty night in Omaha, where the Midwest fades out and the wild and woolly Plains take hold.

A night like this, here in the rolling hills of eastern Nebraska, reminds one of being a Who, safely stowed away in Horton's icebox. A day like the one preceding this February prairie night reminds one of . . . being a Who, safely stowed away in Horton's icebox.

With the light left on.

Horton, by the way, never defrosts his icebox. He probably should take care of that.

He probably will . . . this spring.


WHENEVER I MENTION life in the Gret White Nawth to family and friends back in Louisiana -- particularly the unrelenting rituals of the dead of a Nebraska winter, like braving the blowing snow . . . dressing in many layers . . . shoveling the snow . . . reshoveling what's drifted -- the reaction is nearly universal. Horror is what it is.

People think I'm nuts. People think the North Pole must be pretty close to Omaha, and that nobody in his right mind is gonna live at the damn North Pole.

And regular snowfall is a sure sign of God's wrath upon the terminally stupid.

Of course, this reaction comes from a state where the last white Democrat will change his party registration to "R" by 2013. That is, if the world doesn't come to an end in December 2012, all life extinguished by a rogue glacier sliding southward from somewhere near . . . Omaha.

Maybe St. Paul. All dem places up Nawth is all de same, cher -- cold, cold.

Frankly, I think the Republicanization of my home state somehow may the be source and the sustenance of the Southern horror at all things cold and snowy. Snow, after all, is socialist.

Think about it: It matters not a whit whether one has the finest, most meticulously manicured lawn in the entire upper Midwest or whether yours is a yard ravaged by crabgrass and unsightly patches of dirt the same shade of dingy brown as a 1950s Soviet apartment block. When the snow comes, it's all the same.

IT'S A PATENTLY leftist redistribution of beauty -- No Yard Left Behind. Every yard is covered by a uniform, regimented blanket of socialist snow.

The finest yard is brought down to the proletarian level of the most humble, and the most meager of lawns is -- via some sort of meteorological affirmative action -- lifted up to the same level as that of a McMansion.

Snow ain't white; it's pink. As in "pinko."

Not only that, ice is a communist plot, too, socializing the placement of asses over heads without regard to socioeconomic status, skill, income, educational achievement or race or national origin. A broken bourgeois foot is pretty much the same as a pretzeled proletarian one.

Stuff like that really pousses the cafés of the class-conscious capitalists back in the Gret Stet.

Likewise, the Northern embrace of socialist ice -- like that of pinko snow -- renders useless the advantages of a solid, upper middle-class Cadillac Escalade over that of a poor-white-trash '82 Chevy Caprice.


While the Escalade may get started quicker on an icy surface, neither it nor the Caprice will fare any differently trying to stop at the traffic light at the bottom of a long hill. Arguably, the advantage here goes to the cash-strapped mope driving the Caprice -- if he T-bones, say, an Escalade . . . so what?

ASSUMING liability coverage, the Caprice driver is out nothing but a crappy old car. The bourgeois pig in the Caddy is out . . . well, he's out the monetary difference between a heavily depreciated, really expensive Caddy and what it costs to replace it with a brand-new one. You could buy, like, six '82 Caprices with that.

Remember, it ain't "black ice" that's your problem, Buster, it's "Red" ice.

And the dictatorship of the Gret White Nawthun proletariat laughs at your pretentious capitalist illusions of superiority, Bubba.

Monday, January 31, 2011

The day before February


Greetings from the upper Midwest, where it's a few minutes from February.

The weather outside is frightful; the coffee inside's delightful. I didn't have a chance to stick a digital camera out the door to take a dark, grainy video of what's going on here in the Gret White Nawth, so I swiped this off the Internets.

It's kind of like this, only without the tidal wave and Empire State Building. As a great philosopher once said, "Dem tings happen."

So does wintertime in Nebraska.

Thursday, January 07, 2010

Five months


Oh, how a mere five months (and a little bit) fly by.

Oh, what changes a mere five months can bring here on the Great Plains.

Above is the wheelbarrow garden bed in our back yard, as pictured July 28. Back then, it was in full flower despite the cooler-than-normal summer, and we were picking messes of mustard greens every week or two.

BUT ALL GARDENS come to an end, and both of ours were done by Oct. 10 (above). It was the first of many snows this fall and winter.


AND NOW, our little wheelbarrow garden bed as seen an hour or so ago. Yesterday's snow is blowing, and the mercury is dropping like a rock.

The forecast, according to Channel 7: Low tonight will be minus-13. High Friday will be minus-5. Low Friday night -- 23 below zero.

Once again, the pioneers were not wimps. Come to think of it, neither are we.

All right, let's go. Bundle up and git 'er done!

Stay South, young man!


Omaha, Nebraska -- a snowy hell.

Its citizens hang on to the tattered threads of their sanity as the wintry apocalypse proceeds apace. It's ice cold out. Worse than ice-cold out. It's worse than Greenland out. As cold as the South Pole out.

And it's snowing. It hasn't stopped snowing for a month now. Nearly 3 feet of the white plague is on the ground.

We're all going to die. But no one will find us until spring -- if it comes this year -- because we will have been drifted over. Goodbye, cruel world.


TAKE HEED, Californians! Listen up, Texans! If you are looking to escape the Sun Belt hell of your own making, this is not the place. We have hell of our own -- snowy hell.

If you come, you will freeze and die.

Take this friendly advice, you Southerners in search of Heartland charm and Midwestern wholesomeness. American Gothic froze over after Grant Wood died of frostbite. In other words, "Stay South, young man!"

Horace Greeley said that before he died of frostbite, too. And then his desiccated carcass was blown away by a tornado when June came around.

REALLY, you people don't want to come here. This land is only fit for hardy Nebraskans; we're used to this stuff.

The preceding message has come to you courtesy of the Keep Nebraska for Nebraskans Committee -- M. Favog, treasurer.

Tuesday, January 05, 2010

A d-d-d-d-day in the l-l-l-l-life


I saw a film today, oh boy.

The English army had just . . . taken a wrong turn, ended up in Omaha and froze solid.

Sorry, Your Majesty. Bad colonists!


YOU GO AHEAD and read what's in today's World-Herald. I'm going to put on another pot of hot tea and curl up into a fetal position:
Snowfall is forecast to resume tonight, with about 4 inches possible.
If you want to warm up, you might consider heading to northernmost Alaska; or to Thule, Greenland; or even Moscow.

None of those places was as cold Monday morning as Omaha.

Shortly after daybreak, the mercury plunged to 20 degrees below zero at Eppley Airfield.

And there's more chilling news ahead.

Winds are expected to pick up Wednesday afternoon, meaning blizzard conditions are briefly possible. Blowing snow could limit visibility for the Wednesday evening and Thursday morning rush hours.

After a slight respite today and Wednesday, dangerously cold conditions are expected to last until Saturday, according to the National Weather Service and AccuWeather, The World-Herald's weather consultant.

Once the arctic air arrives Wednesday evening, forecasters say, it's likely that temperatures won't rise above zero until Saturday. By Friday morning, wind chills could plunge to 30 below, or worse.

In places like Moscow, Thule, and Barrow, Alaska, the lows on Monday ranged from 10 below to 10 above zero. The forecast for Reykjavik, Iceland — highs in the 30s all week — looks like a walk on the beach compared to Nebraska and Iowa.