We have sneaux in the Suburbs of Hell

If you follow weather news you might have heard we got some Sneaux in the Beautiful Suburbs of Hell. Well by the standards Mrs. the Poet and I grew up with we got a light dusting. But considering the last time we had snow visible on the ground I had a flip phone, this is a LOT of snow for around here.

The temperature has never gotten above 20°F today with wind chills hovering around and below zero°. Like I wrote earlier the last time it snowed I was using a flip phone for pictures.

We have about 2″ accumulation as I post this, with more on the way.

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Let it snow

If you know where I live then you know we got some snow for the first time in years. Not snow as in snowball fights and snowmen or -women, but snow as in if you look in the right direction and there’s a dark background you might see it falling, snow. Some places to the west and south got maybe 3 whole inches of accumulation.

We got no accumulation, zip, zero, Nada. Several days of highs in the 50s and 60s including yesterday pretty much assured that the snow not only melted but evaporated as soon as it touched the ground. We got the equivalent of a light rain. And even that was too much for local drivers to avoid crashing, but traffic was low because foo’bawl on TV, so while the wrecks were spectacular and will probably make a compilation video on YouTube, they were few in number. Delivery drivers took a figurative beating, though. Lots of “black ice” out there as overpasses and bridges froze when the road that had dirt under it was clear. As a former pizza driver and ice racer I felt all their pains. I felt even worse for the places that actually got snow. Lots of wrecks out there in the boonies away from the DFW area.

We didn’t have game today, so I still haven’t had the chance to try my new stats, but we did ride to the Legless Wurm in my freshly restored Ford Americar with upgraded armor and suspension. We just got beer and whiskey and some tofu scrambles to talk over while we discussed tactics and intel about the extraction operation for the troll female teen. Since we didn’t play because we were down a player nothing important was discussed, it was mostly just a RP session. We got comfortable playing our characters, and that’s about it.

Y’all be careful out there and stay safe. I have the nagging feeling the bovine byproduct is about to impact the rotary air moving device.

Happy 50% off chocolate day, on a Wreck-Free Sunday

Today and tomorrow are the days that are usually the best for getting cheap chocolate candy, most of the grocery stores in my area have hacked prices by half or more. Just stay outta my way. I WILL run you over.

The RPG group did not have a good night last night, as we lost two players to personality issues. My warlock could not hit the broad side of a barn with his eldrich blast, I had a bad case of bad dice. My perception and listen checks came out great, I could see and hear all kinds of things that the rest missed. So it averaged out. Also I finally had a chance to use my “you ain’t dead” cantrip spell, twice. Of course had I been able to hit my targets better that would not have been necessary.

I did the service this morning, as some of you may have surmised from the post from last Saturday entitled “Sermon”. I had some technical difficulties with my laptop in that while I could expand my active screen to both the laptop screen to the HD TV we have on one wall, and get audio out through the HDMI cable, I could not get the videos to play on the TV while leaving my sermon up on the laptop screen. They would not drag over to the TV and nothing I did would cause anything I had open on the laptop screen to move to the TV. The workaround was to mirror the display on both screens, have the remote for the TV at the podium with the lap top, and switch the TV off when I had to read the sermon and back on when I had a video to show. The problem with that was I could not read the sermon while the video was showing so I had to read stuff before that I was supposed to read during.

Now I have to get my head together for a sermon due the end of next month, for April Fools’ Day. My previous services on that day have varied in quality between legendary and Stoopid. My Banishing Chaos services tended towards the Stoopid, but some of my embracing chaos services tended to the legendary. The one where I used children to call the elements as Yakko, Wakko, and Dot Warner with one of the mothers in the church to be Hellooo! Nurse was one of the more legendary services I have performed. And the Meditation that turned into a game of Dodgeball also falls under that legendary tending to Stoopid or perhaps Legendarily Stoopid. So I have a high hurdle to surmount of my own creation.

I leave you with this link to a very pleasant video of people bicycling during a steady snowfall. What it Feels Like in Winter Cycling Paradise See, it can be done with the right equipment. Notice that most of those bikes were equipped with studded tires for getting traction on ice.

PSA, Opus

Welcome to December, and the Feed

You may have noticed things floating across the blog today, that’s just the “snow” that comes to WP every December to acknowledge that in the northern hemisphere this is the beginning of Winter. We actually had some snow already, but it didn’t stick so we didn’t have anything to show for it. Just as well, people in Dallas go absolutely apeshit when there is anything wet on the roads, and things get even worse when “wet” is also “frozen”. Things are just so strange here in the Beautiful Suburbs of Hell… XD

Why was the freeway shut down last week? Shut’em Down for Michael Brown

A little NY Infrastructure! news that is not good. Suffolk residents concerned about cyclist safety This one county is the most deadly county for cyclists in the US, even worse than FL.

The most annoying infrastructure problem ever. Get Your Cameras Ready for Half-Empty Black Friday Parking Lots All those acres of pavement doing nothing, except destroying the tax base.

First they decided it was a great idea to put pedestrians on the bike path, then they start thinking about banning bikes, from the bike path. Push to shut Clover Moore’s City of Sydney shared cycleways: No risk assessment of city’s shared paths increases threat of law suit Here’s a suggestion: ban pedestrians from the bike path instead of bikes.

Our Daily Ted from CA. Morning Links: The Times looks at rising bike hit-and-run rates; and the year’s most inspirational video

Remembering a cyclist that slid under a truck after falling in a mixed experience peloton. More than 200 take part in bike ride in memory of Kendall cyclist This is one of the most dangerous things about riding in a mixed group, one mistake and you’re in traffic. Then you’re under traffic.

NHS is feeling the budget crunch, and the crunch catches injured cyclists. Woman cyclist in her 60s ‘left lying injured in road for an hour and a half’ Yep, this blows the “Golden Hour” all to heck. For those unaware, getting an injured person to medical attention in under an hour from getting hit by or with a car substantially increases the survival rate and reduces the incidence of complications.

Preparing for the change in the weather presaged by the “snow” in the blog. DASHING THROUGH THE SNOW: WINTER BIKE COMMUTING BASICS The biggest thing for riding in winter is keeping warm, dry, and upright… Take care of that and you got it beat.

And those were all the links I could find without wrecks today.

Billed @€0.02, Opus the unkillable badass Poet