Way to go Rochester! It took awhile but for the first time this season Rochester has slipped by Buffalo by 2/10 of an inch. I’ve been saying it for awhile now. Don’t ever count Rochester out because they are well known for their late season runs and they are on one of them right now. For those of you in Buffalo, blame it on the General of Buffalo. Ever since he dismissed his army of snowmen, or did they melt, Buffalo has been on bigger down hill slide than a skier on Mt. Everest.

It almost makes that freak October snowstorm a wasted event. Ok, really it doesn’t because what ever records were set by the storm should be around for a long time but still with all that early snow it is surprising to see Buffalo in third place now. The big question is how many back and Fourths will take place between now and the end of the snow season between the city’s. Once again I have to say that Syracuse in no way has this locked up and Buffalo and Rochester are slowly chipping away and the couple of inches here and there add up. Sooner or later another storm will be hitting and the stats can change in the blink of an eye so don’t count any of the city’s out yet. Ok, count Albany out and perhaps Binghamton is running out of time but the trophy is up for grabs for the city’s taken and I think we are going to see the lead that Syracuse has get smaller and smaller.

Way to go Rochester, ZR and Jessica for overtaking Buffalo!!! Have a super day all!

I was just updating the stats and noticed a couple of things. Both Buffalo and Rochester are above last years total snowfall amounts for the year. In other words they have already had bettter (worse) season than last year with plenty of snow to go. The big question is whether they can go over thier average snowfall for the season. Early in the season I predicted that they could. Looking at their normal average snowfall up until todays date they are right on course to do so. This is the first time I believe that Rochester has caught up to their average snowfall for this time in the season. Buffalo of with the freak October snow storm they had was ahead of their average for a good part of the season but slipped behind it. They are finally right around the average to date. Syracuse is only 4.7 inches away from hitting their yearly average snow totals and when the next update comes out most likely only a couple of inches away.

A message to all the snow lovers in Buffalo like the General and Jill. You might want to get the snow dance or any other ritual you might have to bring on some snow. Rochester is really on your back now being the closest they have been all season from over taking second place. They are only 2.4 inches away from sliding into second.

I haven’t seen any other predictions but the Goldensnoball.com’s prediction was that most of the city’s would have an above normal snowfall. So far it’s looking like we still have a good chance with 3 of the city’s hitting above normal and it’s a long shot right now with Binghamton and Albany going above their average snowfall totals but not out of the question. Now all we need is for the rest of the cities to get moving and catch Syracuse to make this a race. Have a great day all!

A little summary of what took place last night with the Golden Snowball competition and the Weather Channel. Earlier in the week the weather channel contacted me about perhaps doing an interview sometime on the Abrams and Bettes show. I thought about it for about 2 seconds and said sure, it sounds like fun. Well yesterday afternoon I received a phone call from a man named Pete. A super nice guy saying they wanted to do the interview that evening. For the record I did try to pass this off to Dennis Brogan but couldn’t reach him. He’s use to the media and handles it well 🙂

Calm, cool and smooth. That’s me. NOT! Knowing the show was live panic set in as soon as the phone rang at around 8:42pm. It was Pete telling me to get ready, about a minute to go. I told Pete what a sissy man I am, he laughed and the next thing I know I was talking (stuttering) with Mike Bettes and Stephanie Abrams live on the weather channel. I would of loved to gotten a lot more in about the contest but at least the weather channel knows about it now. It would be fun to hear them mention our contest when they mention our city’s during the forecasts.

I mentioned to my forum members that most likely I will be saying Ummm a lot. I did that during the press conference in December when we awarded the trophy to Jeff, the man in charge of our DPW. One of my forum members said to just pause instead. I told him I would try that but if he hears a long pause, that means I probably passed out from the pressure 🙂 The worse thing was that while I was on the phone doing the interview the call waiting was beeping like crazy. Talk about losing concentration.

The biggest screw up (and there were many) other than the heavy breathing which I will explain in a minute was be trying to mention about how we kid and razz each others city’s and mentioning how someone from Buffalo made snowmans. 1 snowman + 1 snowman = 2 snowmans Yeah I’m an idiot and normally proud of it except for when it comes to national attention on one of my favorite stations, the Weather Channel. As soon as I said snowmans I just rolled my eyes. I did recover the next sentence though and said snowmen. Have I mentioned yet how attractive Stephanie is and man what a smile. Sorry, I’m wondering off a bit.

As for the heavy breathing on the show I blame that on my back. Really! It’s nothing to do with my bad habit of cigarettes. I pulled my back out several days ago from shoveling some of the heavy snow that came down last week. I did send Pete an email apologizing for that and told him that I can’t help it I get excited when talking about snow and the Golden Snowball award.

Ok, enough about last night and a big thanks to the Weather Channel, Stephanie, Mike and Pete for giving us a chance to explain what our contest is. In reality the weather channel is on here most of the day. I’m a little skeptical about putting a link up to the video but what the hay. For those of you who missed it last night and need a chuckle check it out at the Abrams and Bettes section on the weather channel at http://www.weather.com/aboutus/television/abramsandbettes/index.html?from=footer Just scroll down to the video section.

Also Sean Kirst from the Post Standard has a new blog now and he is looking for some feedback about the Winterfest and the Golden Snowball contest at http://blog.syracuse.com/kirst/2007/02/the_golden_snowball_and_winter.html You might of heard me mention Sean’s name. No doubt he is the person most responsible for getting and keeping this contest in the news and growing. Have a super weekend all!

If you have a chance tonight check out the Abrams and Bettes show on the weather channel tonight. They are going to do a small segment on our great New York Golden Snowball contest. The show is on at 8pm Mondays – Fridays. It’s a great show with a lot of live broadcasting around the US and then some.

You also may get a chance to see the sissy man snowman, me, make a fool out of myself during a telephone interview. You all know how I go into panic mode during interviews. So I will apologize now for all the ummms, stuttering and wrong answers that I give. I will however to my best to make NY proud. Unfortunately during interviews the toad in me comes out. More to come as it happens and a warm, make that a cold, snowy welcome to Goldensnowball.com for those fans of Stephanie and Mike coming from the weather channel tonight.

Who would of thought that Syracuse, Rochester and Buffalo would even be close to their season snow averages this soon with the way the stats were just a couple of weeks ago. Not me! One good storm along with some lake effect has put the 3 city’s on track to at least hit the average annual snowfall and maybe then some.

It’s still a race and there is still a lot of time left for anything to happen for any of the cities. Like I said a couple of times, watch out for Rochester. They are showing some new snow almost every day now and it’s just a matter of time when they set up just right into some decent lake effect snow. As for Buffalo, they have always been sneaky when it comes to their snow. Look what they snuck in on us all in October, 22+ inches which will be a record that will be hard for any of the cities to topple.

Don’t let Syracuse’s 104.3 inches of snow fool ya’s into thinking it’s a wrap. Wayyyy too much time left in the season and I don’t think we are done with the coastal storms either yet. I’m thinking at least a couple more of them which normally benefit the south-east cities in New York but they have hung to the west more than once. If that happens Rock City could benefit by the storm and the lake effect just like Syracuse did this last one.

Greg Lavadas from the Democrat and Chronicle in Rochester has an article out today about the contest at http://www.democratandchronicle.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?Date=20070219&Category=NEWS01&ArtNo=702190332&Ref=AR

I know what you are all thinking. Like they need any advertising at all right now up North and I am sure they have all they can handle right now. True but people are visiting another website I own and looking for plowing services. Here’s the situation! Myself and my partner started up a free local coupons and savings website for Central New York. We started it up not too long ago and we noticed it has been getting some visitors, not a lot but enough to our website at www.cnydiscounts.com that are searching for snow plow services in the Fulton, Oswego area. With the situation up there with roofs and them still clearing the snow the chances are some people might be having a hard time finding someone. Anyways, We figured we would give a listing to the north country so that maybe the people coming to our site can hook up with someone in their area who has some time to get around to them.

So if anyone snow plowers, residential or commercial from up north are interested in having their business ad listed at http://www.cnydiscounts.com/snow-plowing.html at no charge for the rest of this season just go to http://www.cnydiscounts.com/internet-advertising.html and scroll down to where it says Contact and send us an email with a brief description of your business info, area’s you can cover and contact information for us to post on the site. If you can offer the people some kind of discount like 5 – 10 percent off that would be great also but not necessary.

Ok, back to the Golden Snowball award. This last week has made a huge difference all around. A close race for first is slipping away but not over yet. After the 10.1 inches that Syracuse received from yesterday from some lake effect snow they jumped to a lead of over 2 feet. Now way did I imagine that would happen. Not this week anyways. Rochester remains just 5 inches away from sliding past Buffalo. I kind of expected Rochester to make some kind of charge but not a 2 day charge. Binghamton and Albany still need quite a bit but they took a huge jump after the storm. Neither are a threat yet but a couple more of those storms they could come into play.

Eric, a visitor to GSB sent an email to me about how if the snow we just received in Syracuse the last 29 days was all in one month we would of broken a monthly record that was set in January of 2004 of 78.1 inches. Eric mentioned that when he took his daughter to college on Jan 18th we only had around 12 inches give or take a little. If that’s the case that means from then until Feb 16th we have received around another 86 inches or so. That’s a lot of snow! There is still plenty of time even though Feb is a short month to break the Syracuse monthly record. Right now we are at 48.0 inches, only 30.2 to go for a new record. It would be interesting to see some of the other cities monthly records. Have a great weekend all!