It’s the wind, you know


Yesterday, some of you jeered at the small amount of snow we were getting. It’s a fair cop; here in Western Minnesota, we’re a little dryer than the eastern part of the state, and we get measurably less snow. Where we make up for that is that we’re also colder and much, much windier. We get a small amount of powdery snow and then the wind keeps picking it up and blowing it around. Yesterday, our driveway was completely clear. This is how it looks this morning.

There is a car under the snow on the left side of the top picture.

We don’t go anywhere anymore, but there have been a few occasions when we were unable to travel on Highway 28, the main connecting route from Morris to I94, because drifting snow has completely covered the road to a depth of 8′-10′ in some spots.

I do find the swooping curves of our snow dunes quite pretty, though.

Comments

  1. davidc1 says

    I have often posted in the past about how good old England comes to a complete standstill
    under anything over a mm of snow,we are now under water. The flood plain just below where I live is
    well flooded.That twat faced twat johnson normally don’s his high vis jacket and gets himself
    filmed looking concerned at the poor flooded sods who bought their shoe box houses that
    were built on a known flood plain,but now he is far two busy doing his Winnie act.

  2. birgerjohansson says

    If I could figure out how to manage the alien-level tech of my cellphone (I am middle-aged) I would send a picture from the snowstorm February last year. It took several days for the aurhorities to dig out our street.
    As a bonus, I slipped and got a fracture in a foot.
    But at least I escaped Covid, and my workplace and co-workers are wonderful so I am content.
    -If the snowdrifts arrive when P Z has a day off I would suggest you just curl up with warm cocoa and enjoy the ride.

  3. blf says

    This is Mistral season in this part of S.France, and it’s been blowing quite strong yesterday (over 100 km/hr yesterday, and not much less today), making it bloody cold! For this area, that is… it’s sunny and hence, even with the wind chill, still above freezing. Even at night, albeit then it can get down to almost freezing. Today’s outdoors market was mostly empty, very probably most of the stallholders said (in Française) “teh feck with this” and sensibly stayed home.

  4. blf says

    @5, Their behaviour seems, to me, to be that of a troll, such as: Keeping using a factually-incorrect description which annoys and insults other people because it annoys and insults other people; biZzaRE.tYpiNG; rarely-to-never citing sources; and (at least sometimes) vehemently rejecting evidence contrary to their beliefs. As a reminder, not too long ago, they refused to believe Churchill was racist, etc., despite copious documented evidence. They got very angry about being presented with that evidence. What I am seeing now is a similar irrational response, this time to having it pointed out the use of that term is misogynistic on both sides of the Atlantic.

  5. birgerjohansson says

    OT
    Some good news: the attempt to create a US version of the Canadian truck convoy seems to have fizzled- there have been few recruits so far. Maybe they realised American cops tend to be a level of magnitude harder than their Canadian counterparts.

  6. blf says

    me@9, Sorry, clicked Post by accident! Continuing… Admittedly, in at least some of those comments, they do cite sources (albeit checkers found some rather dubious ones), and kept the biZzaRE.tYpiNG to a minimum. But seems to me, both then and now, rather trollish.

  7. says

    I was tempted to find a bit of their culture to use against them but I’m not convinced there is a useful way to do that. With the avoidance of learning about bigotry in general the political and national flavors are hard bring up without distraction.

    So many people clinging to useless and/or counterproductive tools and tool use.

  8. davidc1 says

    HAHA,poor old David C,no one like him.As I posted elsewhere I am practising my freedom of speech.
    I am not a sexist ,I am not a woman hater,I just don’t like being bullied.

  9. davidc1 says

    @16&17,Still don’t understand a word you are saying. Meat computers? Do you mean a Lambchop,not a laptop?

  10. PaulBC says

    davidc1@15 I have nothing against you personally, but I don’t see why you can’t adjust your insult portfolio to fit local standards.

  11. asclepias says

    That looks a lot like our driveway after a snowstorm. The size of the drift depends on the amount of snow we get. We have a 30-foot-tall blue spruce that my dad wanted to move to the other corner of the yard as a windbreak when we first moved here over 30 years ago, but at the time, it was the only tree on the block, so the neighbors rebelled against the idea. (For the next couple of days we’re in the deep freeze, with wind chill well below zero.)

  12. vereverum says

    ” For the next couple of days we’re in the deep freeze, with wind chill well below zero. ”

    After which did you go say to your neighbors: “Now, you going to be reasonable or do I have to do that again?”

  13. blf says

    Follow-up of sorts to @6, et al., On the seemingly troll-like behaviour: I haven’t gone back and searched / checked, so this is all from my notorious memory, but they also very recently complained about not being able to comment at the Grauniad. At first their complaint seemed to be technological (but was difficult to understand), and after a few helpful suggestions and questions, they revealed they’d been banned(? always go into moderation?). Presuming that claim and my memory are broadly correct, we are now possibly getting an insight into why they were banned / whatevered…

  14. davidc1 says

    Basically,all you people who are on my case can go piss up a rope,I will continue to use my fav insult for that twat faced twat johnson until Dr Myers tells me not to.

  15. says

    Until PZ decides otherwise, or the people harmed by misogynistic slurs choose to push more, you are a pet misogynist to analyze and metaphorically vivisect on the screen.
    Pats head
    You have the courage hurt others. Answer my question. Why do you choose to use vagina as an insult?

  16. blf says

    People are objecting to the misogynistic nature of the insult.

    And that it’s so uncreative. Boring. Not at all clever. So to help… The first one that popped up at Shakespearean Insults Generator! describes “villainous base-court foot-licker” Johnson quite well. As teh Borris is (supposedly) writing a book about Shakespeare, styling one’s terms for “that huge bombard of sack” of an alleged-PM is more clever, less troll-ish, much less boring, and less likely to be constantly misogynistic. (That second insult is from http://www.pangloss.com/seidel/Shaker/index.html, which attributes it to one of the Henry plays (I neglected to note precisely which one, Sorry!).)

    Also from the second link, what we seem to have here is a case of someone “[t]hou wouldst eat thy dead vomit up, And howl’st to find it” (from Henry IV, part 2).

  17. davidc1 says

    @37 You continue to talk nonsense,do you get paid by the word?
    As I posted somewhere else in reply to your no 1 fan,since the Pussy Grabbing tape came to light,my fav insult
    for that twat faced twat trump,is The Snatch Snatcher
    What are your views on that,I have been using it long enough on here for you to have noticed it.
    Do you consider snatch a demeaning and insulting word for ladies front bottoms?

  18. says

    @davidc1
    You haven’t quoted nonsense. And T— was another excuse to address the issue. Why would you ask me about a word that does not involve my anatomy? When I am sitting on top of the insult privilige heap? Incompetence. You don’y care about the people affected.

    If you don’t have the stamina for this you will be showing people who have been abused with these slurs that you don’t have the strength to keep using them. You will whine and stop or leave independent of anything PZ does.

    @chigau
    Thank you. I get it wrong too.

  19. davidc1 says

    @40 More gibberish,I have never called a woman a twat,some have called me a dick,should I go cry about it.
    Ladies front bottom come from a British comedy show called The Fast Show,don’t try and find it on youtube,
    you would only be offended.
    The recurring sketch is called She Is Different With Men,a female character is seen chatting with her female
    friends,but when a MAN turns up she turns into a airhead bimbo.
    Front bottom is from the one where she is in a Doctor’s waiting room talking about her vagina with another woman
    when the Male Dr turns up she she tells him there is something the matter with her front bottom.
    HAHA BLOODY HA.

  20. says

    Still no quotes of nonsense. No actual engagement. Ignoring of ladies who have expressed offense to shield themselves with comedy sketches.

    All you can do is incompetently sputter. If you saw nonsense you would quote it. Except for the fear. So you replace the fear with incompetent rage.

  21. says

    You mentioned getting bullied earlier. If I wanted to bully you I would follow you all over pharyngula and harass you into this post. Instead I’m sitting right here.

    You on the other hand are definitely finding places in different posts to push boundaries. Even spreading into menstruation and lesbian humor. How many people’s lives do you want to use to defuse your own negative feelings with.

  22. says

    And on that post with the menstruation misinformation david commented with ,
    “I think I will past on commenting on this topic.”.

    Commenting and not commenting. One of societies’s lies. An adult version of “I’m not touching you” maybe.

  23. blf says

    Brony@44, A request, please: Include references. E.g., the close-to-being-a-troll’s comment “I think I will past on commenting on this topic” was in Says the Facebook wanker with a mustache…. Whilst that source might be more-or-less obvious at the present time, as time passes and memories fade, or for readers who are not following very closely, having a better clew what it is which is being referred-to can be very helpful. (As a possibly-relevant aside, one of my own observations is this close-to-being-a-troll “rarely-to-never cit[es] sources” (see @6).) Thanks!

  24. davidc1 says

    More gibberish,do I have to hold up a sign when I make a joke? I know you muricans think irony means something made of iron,didn’t know you don’t get sarcasm as well.Anyway done replying to your nonsense,you can continue to believe I am the biggest sexist woman hater in the world,and I eat babies,and kick dogs,and rob blind people,I don’t care.