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Winter 2022/23 Banter Hangout


Chicago Storm
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18 hours ago, RogueWaves said:

Agree on the topic of using the cold 60's & 70's (and first half of 80's) as the benchmark, even though that's exactly what climate science cites for their arguments. The past (3) JAN's were cold, just fraught with BN snowfall. I hate to say it, but gimme some damned Clippers already. They were the best feature of last winter. 

Amen. Actually Detroit was plagued by the cold with low snowfall trend several times in the 1960s. Things changed in the 1970s obviously with snow. Imagine taking a time machine to 1978 or 1979 and analyzing the winters of the past decade (cold cold cold with a few mild). All the talk would be "WOW look at how much warmer winters used to be. This is unprecedented and alarming". Voila let's call for an ice age. I will never take anything seriously that uses the 1970s as all time baseline or even worse, the favorite "since 1970..".

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13 hours ago, beavis1729 said:

Your data from earlier years was downtown Chicago, which used to be the official reporting location…which of course is warmer than ORD in January due to lake/UHI. It’s not an apples to apples comparison. 
 

So, maybe the 1960s-80s were a bit cooler than other decades in Chicago, but not nearly as much as your numbers above might suggest. 
 

I know for a fact that Chicago normals in January were 29/13 when I was growing up in the 80s and 90s. When I was going to NIU in DeKalb (65 miles west of Chicago) in the 90s, their January normals were even colder…something like 27/9…which is close to or even a bit colder than Madison’s current January normals (!). 

Even if your point is somewhat correct, that would actually be even more depressing…as our current January normals would be expected to continue (or get even worse) going forward. For my own winter sanity, I refuse to accept that. I grew up with January normals of 29/13, so anything warmer is a disappointment. 

We can barely hold any cold in Dec and Feb these days (normal highs are in the low 40s on Dec 1 and Feb 28)…so it’s tragic to lose January too. 

I wasn’t comparing Chicago to the mid-Atlantic…I was only sharing a post from that forum that seems to capture the zeitgeist of the crappy winters that pretty much every location south of 45N and east of the Mississippi has had since 2014-15. And I’m talking snow depth days and the consistent feel of winter, not just snowfall amounts or some occasional wintry periods (which tell a very incomplete story). Either way, 38” is pathetic for an annual snowfall average. It just is.

Where are the clippers? Where are the minor-moderate snow events? Where is the cold other than 5 days in December? 5 cold days out of 40 in met winter so far isn’t what I would call winter.

My definition of a wintry day is a day with a max temp of 32 or colder AND 2”+ of snow cover. I use 2” as the threshold because a T-1” depth usually means some bare spots in exposed areas…which is unacceptable.

So far this winter, Chicago has had…you guessed it…zero wintry days. Score yet another victory for the fooking general public and media. :clap:

 

I see your point too. And I said if any winter is ripe for complaining it's this one. But those aren't "my numbers". Those are the official Chicago numbers. Every place goes thru site changes so it is what it is. So the official Chicago numbers show January today is the same or colder than the first half of the 20th century.

Our winters OVERALL have been pretty average since 2015. There have been ups and downs. And CERTAINLY frustrating periods. But Chicago was almost -30° in 2019 and had nearly 2 feet of snow on the ground in 2021. Those are clearly wintrier than is typical.

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I am not a fan of grading winter until it's done. And this is especially early. 

 

But id go D.

 

I mean what more can be said that hasn't been lamented over and over about the bad. The good times however were the November 19 arctic front dropping a quick almost 2" snow with below zero wind chills. Then of course Christmas week. Blizzard conditions Dec 23 with -30 wind chills despite only 2.4" of snow there were some impressive drifts. Then waking up to a surprise 2" blanket Christmas morning. So arguable Christmas day was the most winter wonderland day of the season, snow depth of 4-5" with good drifts. 

 

 

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Anyone else find SAD especially bad this winter?  Perpetually cloudy, bare ground, and in the 30s is the worst.  It's just cold enough to make me want to sleep all the time, not cold enough to be invigorating.  I'm not just being dramatic.  I'm seriously depressed right now.  Like I don't even know if I'd get excited about a snowstorm these days.  Hard time caring about anything.  Anhedonia and constant mental exhaustion for no reason is the worst. No end in sight.

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11 minutes ago, frostfern said:

Anyone else find SAD especially bad this winter?  Perpetually cloudy, bare ground, and in the 30s is the worst.  It's just cold enough to make me want to sleep all the time, not cold enough to be invigorating.  I'm not just being dramatic.  I'm seriously depressed right now.  Like I don't even know if I'd get excited about a snowstorm these days.  Hard time caring about anything.  Anhedonia and constant mental exhaustion for no reason is the worst. No end in sight.

Try supplementing with vitamin D (or increase the dose if you already do).  

- Amateur Dr. Hoosier

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22 minutes ago, frostfern said:

Anyone else find SAD especially bad this winter?  Perpetually cloudy, bare ground, and in the 30s is the worst.  It's just cold enough to make me want to sleep all the time, not cold enough to be invigorating.  I'm not just being dramatic.  I'm seriously depressed right now.  Like I don't even know if I'd get excited about a snowstorm these days.  Hard time caring about anything.  Anhedonia and constant mental exhaustion for no reason is the worst. No end in sight.

I was having a conversation about this topic as a warning to my friend -- a transplant from Vegas -- just before I opened this thread! Indeed it's been extremely cloudy lately. I appreciate all the seasons and have gone for road trips just to enjoy the different scenes around the lakes... but can still feel that extra heaviness associated with the lack of sunshine. It is important to get as much sun as possible and to be aware of this effect. I will also add that it's not really a disorder if it's a perfectly natural phenomenon that affects everyone

Pictured: me, this morning, enjoying the first real sunshine of the year (I also love lasagna)

image.thumb.png.fc902a4cb08b9aeba72fc598b23eda7a.png

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Anyone else find SAD especially bad this winter?  Perpetually cloudy, bare ground, and in the 30s is the worst.  It's just cold enough to make me want to sleep all the time, not cold enough to be invigorating.  I'm not just being dramatic.  I'm seriously depressed right now.  Like I don't even know if I'd get excited about a snowstorm these days.  Hard time caring about anything.  Anhedonia and constant mental exhaustion for no reason is the worst. No end in sight.

I’ll take this all winter over that crap around Christmas.
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12 hours ago, SnOvechkin said:

I was having a conversation about this topic as a warning to my friend -- a transplant from Vegas -- just before I opened this thread! Indeed it's been extremely cloudy lately. I appreciate all the seasons and have gone for road trips just to enjoy the different scenes around the lakes... but can still feel that extra heaviness associated with the lack of sunshine. It is important to get as much sun as possible and to be aware of this effect. I will also add that it's not really a disorder if it's a perfectly natural phenomenon that affects everyone

Pictured: me, this morning, enjoying the first real sunshine of the year (I also love lasagna)

image.thumb.png.fc902a4cb08b9aeba72fc598b23eda7a.png

depressing carpet wall combo 

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31 minutes ago, SchaumburgStormer said:

Had the christmas storm actually been something noteworthy, I would be fine riding it out till spring. But I have been able to clear by driveway with a broom all season, so I would like at least 1 shovel-able event that is not in May. 

We're gonna get an Easter dumping like none other.

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12 hours ago, cyclone77 said:

Checkout Deadwood from HBO if you haven't seen it, you'll love it! :P

Oh I have and I curse like them every time these damn dogs come storming into the house.  I even have a couple of Deadwood sidewalks out by the shed with some old 2x10's.  It'll freeze good eventually then then walking on these frozen mud stalagmites will be even more entertaining and dangerous lol.

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59 minutes ago, luckyweather said:

Sunshine the past two days west of ORD has been a welcome change. 

Odds of a super volcano eruption this century (ice age inducing to some degree) are 1 in 170. Odds of a large/Pinatubo style eruption are 1 in 6. Volcanos may be our only hope for a decent winter at 43 north given how things are trending. 

Let's go for the Yellowstone eruption.  Nobody will care about winter then.

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16 hours ago, luckyweather said:

Sunshine the past two days west of ORD has been a welcome change. 

Odds of a super volcano eruption this century (ice age inducing to some degree) are 1 in 170. Odds of a large/Pinatubo style eruption are 1 in 6. Volcanos may be our only hope for a decent winter at 43 north given how things are trending. 

There's plenty of factors that give us decent winters. Just like the ones that give us crappy winters. Things like enso, volcanoes etc are all just a piece of a puzzle. 

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Maybe one of the observers can help me here. Under the cloud category from ASOS sites, what does VV mean? I get CLR, FEW, BKN, OVC And SCT. But VV is throwing me for a loop. I know I will look like a complete idiot when it is something obvious but sometimes I can be downright plain dense.

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27 minutes ago, bowtie` said:

Maybe one of the observers can help me here. Under the cloud category from ASOS sites, what does VV mean? I get CLR, FEW, BKN, OVC And SCT. But VV is throwing me for a loop. I know I will look like a complete idiot when it is something obvious but sometimes I can be downright plain dense.

Vertical visibility.

It's the height an observer or ASOS can see upward into a surface based obscuration that covers the sky. However, it's not strictly used in that fashion.

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