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      Welcome!   03/05/2016

      Welcome, everyone, to the new 910CMX Community Forums. I'm still working on getting them running, so things may change.  If you're a 910 Comic creator and need your forum recreated, let me know and I'll get on it right away.  I'll do my best to make this new place as fun as the last one!

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On 5/23/2018 at 2:28 PM, mlooney said:

It's 85 degrees F, feels like 90 and has a 50% chance of rain today and an 80% chance tomorrow.   Storm fronts are a known trigger for migraines for me, which might explain why I have been fighting a medium to mild headache for the last 3 days.  Not bad enough to take /strong/ drugs for, but bad enough that I need to keep track of when I took what so I don't take too much of any one analgesic. 

Different location, but I've been having to keep track of when I last took Tylenol and aspirin due to some rather unpleasant cramps.  Aspirin was a low dose once or twice a day, mostly for anti-clotting effect, but I needed more Tylenol than I like.  Really, I don't like using any Tylenol, but the drug interaction checkers say my preferred ibuprofen might be an issue and this seems the lesser of three evils.

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Pittsburg, KS (66762)

as of 1:54 pm CDT

88°

Sunny

Feels Like 94°

H 90° / L 66°

UV Index 9 of 10

 

At least we have a 0% chance of rain today and it only goes up to 10% tonight.  Of course any chance of rain of late mean "thunder storms and freaking cats" of late.

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A Tropical Storm Warning is in effect "Until Further Notice"

Is it really that time again?

I am still living with the aftermath of Darth Irma.

 

Current conditions at

Sarasota / Bradenton, Sarasota-Bradenton International Airport (KSRQ)

Lat: 27.4°NLon: 82.56°WElev: 30ft.
ra.png

Light Rain

73°F

23°C

Humidity 90%
Wind Speed SE 9 mph
Barometer 29.84 in (1010.5 mb)
Dewpoint 70°F (21°C)
Visibility 10.00 mi

Last update

26 May 6:53 pm EDT

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The storm has arrived and my cat could care less, unlike last time when she went bonkers. 

PITTSBURG, KS

as of 12:50 am CDT

 
73°
RAIN SHOWER
feels like 73°
H -- L 67°
UV Index 0 of 10

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Pittsburg, KS (66762)
as of 9:18 pm CDT
80°
Clear
Feels Like 86°
H -- L 69°
UV Index 0 of 10

90% chance of a thunderstorm late tonight, 80% in the morning.

Now the important question, how will Susan, my cat, respond to it?

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12 hours ago, mlooney said:

90% chance of a thunderstorm late tonight, 80% in the morning.

Now the important question, how will Susan, my cat, respond to it?

Well, we missed the storm.  Now down to a 50% chance this afternoon.   Susan has been either hanging out in the window "Bird watching" or next to me while I watch videos.

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4 hours ago, mlooney said:

Well, we missed the storm.  Now down to a 50% chance this afternoon.   Susan has been either hanging out in the window "Bird watching" or next to me while I watch videos.

Doing staunch feline duty. You need to keep an eye on the humans, after all. Gods know what they would get up to if they didn't have cats watching them.

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5 hours ago, The Old Hack said:
10 hours ago, mlooney said:

Well, we missed the storm.  Now down to a 50% chance this afternoon.   Susan has been either hanging out in the window "Bird watching" or next to me while I watch videos.

Doing staunch feline duty. You need to keep an eye on the humans, after all. Gods know what they would get up to if they didn't have cats watching them.

We seemed to have missed the storm altogether,  as it didn't happen today and they are saying 10% for tonight and Friday morning.

Susan, of course, spent the afternoon hiding in her cat cave.

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While my bike was in it's original state, i.e. broken,  the weather was fine and dandy.

Now?  Thunderstorms every day.  Having one now.   I'm less than 100% gruntled by this.

 

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The thunderstorms are messing up my wireless connextion.  It took three tries to place my pizza order.

A lightning strike has messed up the operation of the main gate at work.

But at least the rain is removing the smell of rotting mullet that has permeated everything in the current Red Tide outbreak.

 

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So.  I and my work are in Cook County, just south of the border with Lake County.  Saturday, they're giving blizzard warnings for Sunday night for Lake but not Cook.  Sunday noon a little snow starts, turning to big wet flakes that turn into slush because the ground is still warm, which continues for a few hours -- a lot more snow in the air than actual accumulation because it keeps melting.  But, the forecast is for much colder weather starting Monday mid-day or so.  Meanwhile, all the snow in the air is getting blown around enough to be called a blizzard, even in Cook county by bedtime.

The animal hospital normally opens at 7am, with Doctor appointments starting at 8:30am.  Around 7:30am, I get a group text from the boss that the door locks are both frozen, front and back, and no one can get in, so don't hurry too much if you're still on your way.  Obviously mostly meant for people who are actually supposed to be there at that hour, so I continue preparations to head for work, while wishing I didn't have to.  I get outside much earlier than usual to clean all the snow off my car, and discover that my Court hasn't been plowed at all.  (I live in a townhouse complex, with a main road in a sort of a figure-8, and short little roads called Courts with three to five buildings each that attach to the main road.  I'm at the very end of my Court.)  Boss texts about 8am that she's gotten into the hospital (Yay!).

So, dog in car with heater on, clean off car, then shovel snow from around tires.  Still no plow, although I can hear a backing-up beep from somewhere out of sight now.  The snow is a few inches deep, and still has slush at the bottom that hasn't frozen yet.  This makes it very heavy to shovel, but at least it's not ice that can't be shoveled!  It's deep enough I could get stuck, but shallow enough I could go through it fine, and loose and warm enough I can shovel it easily.  It now being 8:30am, meaning I'm late, I decide to try it.  Back up out of my driveway into the Court okay, start going forward, get a few feet....get stuck.  So, I get out, shovel snow from around all four tires, get back in, drive forward ten feet, get stuck again.  Start-and-stop like this is clearly faster than trying to shovel a full clear path to the other end of the Court myself, plus a few other people have broken ground driving their vehicles out of their places up ahead, so I will likely be able to get out with maybe two or three more gos.

And finally, at 9am (half an hour after work was supposed to start), a little Jeep shows up, with a little bitty Jeep-sized plow on the front.  No wonder it's taking forever to plow our complex, if this is all that's plowing!  But, it's good that it's small and maneuverable, because that means it's able to plow fairly close next to me, then in front of me, and I only have to shovel away the ridge of snow that always forms at the edge of where a plow plows.  I'm finally able to drive over onto the little strip he'd plowed to my left and follow it to the central road, which is at least somewhat plowed although not very well.  The main roads to get to work are better, but still clearly more snowy than they will be later.  Luckily the road surface is still warm, so under all the snow is slush and pavement, not ice, and traction is pretty good.

Final arrival at work, 9:22am.  One of the receptionists who usually starts at 7am is only just arriving, too.  The boss has gone to the breakfast place next door and brought back pancakes, french toast, eggs, etc. for everyone.  The first appointment, with the other doctor on duty, is underway, but I haven't missed anything, as my first (non-cancelled) patient isn't until 10am.  So, it all worked out in the end, and I got a bit of exercise and break in routine.

Oh, and it looks like Mickey doesn't mind snow a bit, he goes charging out into it fearlessly!  Pippin always hated snow, so this is a nice change.  He had a little trouble getting close to the tree and balancing next to it, but figured things out in the end.  :-)

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Sounds like you had a bit of an adventure there, CritterKeeper.

Around here we have about a foot of snow on the ground, deposited over several storms over the past few weeks. There have been a some days with dangerous roads, and some snow removal to do, but nothing too out of the ordinary, except for one small detail: this weather is a month early! I mean, we occasionally get snow in November, but never more than an inch or two, and it never sticks around for more than a few days. I'm still pretty baffled by it all (not to mention annoyed; I've never been much of a fan of winter).

(Incidentally, I don't usually bother to talk about any details about myself that aren't relevant, hence my joking around in the "location" part of my profile, but since it is relevant to this discussion: I'm in central Maine.)

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Yep, like I said, most years during November we might get a couple of storms that drop an inch or two which melts in a day or two; we usually don't get serious storms or snow that sticks around all winter until half-way through December. Of course once it's here to stay it doesn't melt until half-way through March, so that's still roughly three months of snow on the ground (plus another three where it might snow, as we sometimes have a little snow fall in October, and often get one last big storm early in April).

There's actually a fair bit of difference between what northern, central, and southern Maine get for snow. In December and March when we have several inches on the ground, an hour's drive south will get you to places where the ground is bare. And while I've never been to the northernmost parts of Maine, based on the weather reports they get significantly more snow than us (not to mention colder temperatures).

Edited by ChronosCat
Math. Added a few more details while I was at it.

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Forecasts are for five to nine inches of snow between now and noon tomorrow.  Last time we had any significant snow, they took until almost 9:30am to plow my court enough for me to get out.  My first Saturday appointment is at 8am.  I'm really hoping they do better this time around.  They say they will, but my confidence is not high.

If the central street of our complex is plowed but my court isn't, I may call my boss and see if her four wheel drive can pick me up at the intersection.  There's also a part of me that just wants to stay in the office all night and not have to deal with it.  It's not that silly, we have a nice air matress stored here for emergencies and/or patients needing frequent overnight care (and a couple of times a very anxious owner paid a tech to sleep at the hospital while her darlings were boarding).

Since they weren't sure when the snow would start and whether it would be bad by the time I'm done for the night, I did bring a change of clothes, and I keep some food handy at work to make it easier to resist the yummy junk clients give us.  I gave my kitty an extra half-can on my lunch break, so she should be fine until Saturday mid-day if worse comes to worst.  I'm not worried about this storm, I'm more annoyed.

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So, on Saturday morning the plow did indeed come to my Court shortly after 7:15am, giving me plenty of time to shovel out the surprisingly minimal ridge behind my car, the fluffy snow from there to my back tires, and enough of the drifts to the side, to be able to load up Mickey and get to work only a few minutes late.  To learn that my 8am had just cancelled.

So, still being in my boots and coat, I left Mickey in the office and went outside to shovel a path in the grass over to and around a tree.  Our patients have their needs, after all.  I rather enjoy shoveling, it's good exercise and accomplishes something readily visible and useful.  Sort of HIIT (High Intensity Interval Training) if you shovel and them take short rests.  Mickey doesn't seem to mind going through deeper snow, but it's a little difficult to find a place to do his business in it,

The plow was still working on the office lot.  I had actually set up a security webcam (we got it for free with points from purchases) facing the parking lot, so I knew there had been no sign of anyone clearing any snow within its view until 7:30am, which I'm sure thrilled the breakfast restaurant next door that opens at 6am.

The building is L-shaped, with us on the end of the L away from the main road, next to an entrance off a smaller side road with a Citibank in the other side.  There are three rows of parking, two with parking spaces on either side and one along the other leg of the L with spaces only on the other side.  The plow looked like it had just finished plowing one half of the section in front of us, so that's where I and a few others who arrived around the same time parked, to allow them to plow the other sections.  When snow is coming, we usually try to park all in the middle area so they can plow ours, then we move our cars to the cleared area while the plow is still there.  That way we minimize the spaces not plowed due to having a car in them.

Well, there was one plow width cleared along our leg of the L, with ridges of snow with a few brave souls' tire ruts in them along the rest of it.  The bank across the street was worse, and there were ridges of deep snow on the road next to us, too. Whie I was shoveling, along comes a guy in, of all things, a Camaro!  He tried to turn into the Citibank lot and, of course, got stuck in the snow ridges, spinning his wheels endlessly at high speed.  So, I brought my shovel over and offered to help, shoveling out the snow from around and behind his rear wheels so he could get some traction.  I had to tell the guy to please not try driving while I was still back there in case he, you know, actually got traction, and again while I was shoveling out his front wheels, in case the car slid around.  Apparently, people who try to drive a Camaro in Chicagoland in fresh snow are not very good at seeing potential bad outcomes to their actions.  Who would have guessed?

So, I get the snow out of the way, so he can pull out of the ridges and head down the side road back to the main road that's actually plowed.  Instead, he tries to back into the entrance to our lot, and neatly misses completely the area that's actually plowed, instead going directly into the deep ridges where more snow capable vehicles drove, getting himself solidly stuck again.  Right in the way of the plow still working on our lot being able to actually clear them away.

This time I handed him the shovel and watched HIM shovel out his tires.  And took the shovel with me back inside when he was done, being rather cold by then.  If he needed it, he could come get it.  Shed my coat and boots, left them in the office, came back out to the front to join the staff watching as he'd almost immediately gotten himself stuck again.  This time, the plow driver got out and gave him a push to get him going out towards the road, and he finally kept on going and got out of everyone's way.

I guess he gave us some entertainment, until the appointments finally started arriving once the roads were better plowed and salted.  My boss took a turn at shoveling, too, clearing a bit more grass and some sidewalk, before the landlord's crew came to finish the sidewalks.  I think she enjoys shoveling just like I do.  :-)  Of course, if I had to clear an entire driveway in order to get my car out of a garage, I suspect I'd be a lot less happy with it, especially if I was in a hurry.

 

The temperatures have plunged today, and last I heard they're predicting more snow tonight, so clearing it tomorrow may not be as much fun, but it's not supposed to be much more, so maybe I'll only have to brush my car off.  We'll see!

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1 hour ago, CritterKeeper said:

Whie I was shoveling, along comes a guy in, of all things, a Camaro!  He tried to turn into the Citibank lot and, of course, got stuck in the snow ridges, spinning his wheels endlessly at high speed.  So, I brought my shovel over and offered to help, shoveling out the snow from around and behind his rear wheels so he could get some traction.  I had to tell the guy to please not try driving while I was still back there in case he, you know, actually got traction, and again while I was shoveling out his front wheels, in case the car slid around.  Apparently, people who try to drive a Camaro in Chicagoland in fresh snow are not very good at seeing potential bad outcomes to their actions.  Who would have guessed?

So, I get the snow out of the way, so he can pull out of the ridges and head down the side road back to the main road that's actually plowed.  Instead, he tries to back into the entrance to our lot, and neatly misses completely the area that's actually plowed, instead going directly into the deep ridges where more snow capable vehicles drove, getting himself solidly stuck again.  Right in the way of the plow still working on our lot being able to actually clear them away.

This time I handed him the shovel and watched HIM shovel out his tires.  And took the shovel with me back inside when he was done, being rather cold by then.  If he needed it, he could come get it.  Shed my coat and boots, left them in the office, came back out to the front to join the staff watching as he'd almost immediately gotten himself stuck again.  This time, the plow driver got out and gave him a push to get him going out towards the road, and he finally kept on going and got out of everyone's way.

I guess there's no cure for stupid.

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Expecting between 15-25 cm of snow oversnight, feels like -15C outside right now with wind chill and by Wednesday night it'll be -38C with the wind chill. I think this would be pretty apt (though I'm not in Chicago, but I think Critterkeeper's getting the same stuff as I am soo):

50767726_10156484577032572_4987225864161

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