You've got to be kidding me...

Snow?

So I was in Costco...

Once again I am blown away (no pun intended) at how erratic Minnesota weather can be in the course of one week. What's even more amazing are the natives and how they never even flutter an eyelash when 5 feet of snow falls, or it rains for 3 days strait or doesn't rain for a month. They just keep on with their lives and their "Minnesota niceness".

Wednesday was just the same, it had been raining pretty hard all day and when it let up a bit I hauled my 4 children to Costco for a change of scenery, free samples, and some groceries. As we were inside the store, the tornado sirens went off, no one ran for the tornado shelter or started frantically stockpiling water bottles and raisins. People's paces were unchanged and even the old ladies serving samples, didn't miss a beat cutting chicken nuggets into bite size pieces. So of course my thought is, "When in Rome, do as the Romans," and finished up my shopping.

After we checked out, I noticed there was a huge line to leave and then all of the sudden the Exit and Entry doors slammed shut. The manager told us that it was his professional opinion that we stay in the store until the tornado passed. LOL. So the kids and I bought a couple of churros and waited out the near death experience.

We were only delayed for 10 minutes and then once the door were opened we went safely home.
I laughed inwardly at the people who were upset that they had to stay in Costco because of "the weather." May I be in Costco every time there is a tornado or when any sort of inclement weather passes my way.

Wintry mix?

It's snowing again today and apparently there's supposed to be a blizzard or "White Out!" (That's one I haven't heard before.) Weather.com stated, which I check as obsessively as my email, that today there would be a "wintry mix." What's a wintry mix? To me it sounds almost like a sweet party food covered in white chocolate. (can you tell I'm pregnant?)
Being a desert dweller most of my life, I have only known of a few basic adjectives used to describe precipitation. They are: snow, rain, hail, flash flood and humidity. In Las Vegas, that's all that ever happened.
But here in Minnesota it's a whole new world full of words used to describe what comes out the sky and Hans and I wonder and laugh at how there can be so many possibilities. For example: Flurry (no not the milk shake at Mc Donalds), iced rain (no not hail), sleet, blizzard, snow shower, lake-effect snow, snow pellets, soft hail, thundersnow, rimed snow, graupel, fog, and of course wintry mix.
Who knew?


Update: 3/11/09
Today I took the boys to school and the temperature was -4. Just getting into my van was an adventure.
#1 The doors were almost sealed shut because just 2 days ago it was 36, meaning it started melting all the snow, but that night it snowed and went below freezing causing all the water to, well, freeze.
#2 Because it was -4 and I hadn't started my van for a couple of days, it almost didn't start. I did tell the boys if the van didn't start we would all just go back to bed and sleep all day. Too bad for them and me.
#3 The windows were of course covered in frost and snow. As usual I started scraping them, but there was a third layer of icy film that made scraping almost impossible and it appeared that the inside of the window was also filmed over. I etched a 12 x 12 inch square on my side of the van and off we went. Luckily 10 minutes into the drive, the car warmed up and the defroster kicked in, leaving my view crystal clear.

Minnesota weather is so frustrating!

Last week our whole house was feeling pretty plucky because old man Winter had started turning it's stubborn head towards Springtime; the highs here in Minneapolis were in the 40's. The children & I wore our lighter coats, put away our thermal underwear and played outside all day. It was lovely.
I must have forgotten how schizophrenic Minnesota weather is and became outraged on Thursday when it snowed 8 inches. And right now it's brazenly sunshiny, but a total of 17 degrees.

Luckily, Amelia doesn't mind bundling up to play outside