Was it the snow dance or perhaps trying reverse psychology on mother nature? Maybe it was the threat of NYCO to put the Snow God back in the closet or maybe it was just our weather finally doing what it is suppose to do this time of year. SNOW! Whatever the reason sfter one of the lamest, most pitiful snow seasons so far that I can remember, snow is finaly in the air, and on the ground. Up to the north snow is on the ground so fire up the sleds while it’s there. Some unofficial reports are coming in the forum that the Tug Hill area is showing anywheres from 12 – 18 inches and the snow continues to fall. I’m still waiting for Tug Hill Tina to give us a report in the forum as to how much snow she has on the ground there. ZR800 posted in the Golden Snowball forum the following from NOAA:

Other reports so far from the Buff NWS…
Colden 10″
Warsaw 11″
N Oseola 9″
Portagville 6″

None of the GSB city’s are reporting snow from over night. Come tomorrow morning that will all change. NOAA just updated it’s current warnings at http://www.weather.gov/view/prodsByState.php?state=ny&prodtype=warnings

Right now they are predicting 10 – 16 inches in persistant snow areas meaning if the lake effect bands tend to sit in spots or keep devoloping in certain spots, look out. My guess is that all the city’s will see something by morning and I think out of the 5 golden snowball cities, Syracuse is going to win this round with Rochester coming in second.

On January 7th at approximately 10:34 pm this seasons first snow dance was performed. Now all we can do is sit and wait to see what happens. Having a 90% or so success rate in past years I’m expecting that percentage to go up. As I mentioned in our forum I get a little nervous each and every time I perform the dance. Nothing could be worse than me over doing it, doing it wrong or God forbid doing the wrong dance and waking up and seeing on the news that a freak Tidal Wave hit the North East or something.

Right now it is windy and snow is in the forecast. Mostly for the Oswego and Tug Hill area. The dance won’t take credit unless the totals are way over what is predicted seeing how it was already in the forecast before the dance was done. That said, the dance was done to try and bring a sustained cold air mass to the GSB cities and also the surrounding area so that the snowmobilers and skiers can try and salvage the time that is left. Also as pointed out by TioTonto at Syracuse.com I have been leaving out the ice fishing people. The shores haven’t even started to freeze over on the lakes and I am sure they are itching to get out there on the ice.

Out of curiosity, does anyone know if ice fishing is a separate permit? Are you allowed to fish from the shores or from a boat if there isn’t any ice on the lake?

Something scary happened while performing the snow dance last night. I almost thought I was having a hallucination. While performing the ritual I looked around and saw what appeared to be tiny little spots of snow about the size of a small snowball blowing around the yard and the neighborhood. I’m good at what I do but not that good. After a minute or so of thinking I was that good one of the white snowball sized pieces blew against me. As I picked it up I realized what it was. My sisters stopped by this weekend to help take the Christmas decorations down. One of them threw away what my son puts around our Nativity scene every year. Cotton, and lots of it. It turns out that the wind blew over the trash can and all the cotton, tons of it had escaped. So to my neighbors, my bad and if you see some fake snow blowing around my apologies. I tried to gather it up but with the wind the way it was it just wasn’t gonna happen. Just pretend it’s real snow and think of it as more of a late Christmas present from the snowman or better yet, the idiot that lives at the top of the street. Have a Great Week All!

I hate snow. I’m hoping that the weather stays just like it is. Please Mother Nature, don’t let it snow.

OK, before you all pound me with emails calling me a traitor hold off on them. I’m trying reverse psychology on Mother Nature to see if that will work seeing how nothing else has so far. I know it’s not nice to fool Mother Nature but I’ll have to take that chance. In reality I’m sitting around like the rest of you, make that some of you, waiting for this winter to begin.

I just read a couple of articles looking at our seasons weather with 2 different views. Sean Kirst’s article in the Post Standard today talks about how the nice/crappy weather makes it easier on certain people. Read the article here!

Hart Seely also has an article in the Post Standard but with a different look. Hart looks at the way it is effecting the Tug Hill Plateau and other areas that counts on the business from the snowmobilers. Read the article Here!

It will be snowing sometime soon. How do I know you might ask? Because this weekend I will be doing my stupid but normally effective snow dance which so far has worked about 90% of the time. I can’t give the exact time or place because this is a dance that the local, make that world media would just love to get on film. Ok maybe not the world media but I’m sure a neighbor would like to get it on film and post it on youtube.com to show what an idiot the Snowman really is. Enough said! Shine up the skis, tune up the sleds, the snow dance is coming this weekend. Have a Great weekend all!

Normally at the beginning of the season I spend hours trying to find websites or pages that are no longer where they use to be. NOAA is pretty good about moving pages around that have all the stats I use but after awhile searching or with the help of Daver from the forum who works for NOAA I am able to find them.

One of my favorite sites for updated stats from the past and present has always been http://mep1.phy.syr.edu/~rsholmes/snow.html which I believe was kept up by Rich Holmes who I believe is a professor at SU from what my research in the past has shown. Well this snow season the site is no where to be found and man do I miss it. That said I am on a quest to track Rich down and to see if he moved it some place else or if he gave up doing it all together. I’m hoping it was the first of the two, that it was just moved. If you look back the last couple of years you will see that I mentioned the site several times.

Most likely Rich has a great program that he ran that would compare all the data and list it on his site. Great comparisons such as the snowiest months, daily comparisons by seasons and so on. Anyways, I’ve found a couple of contacts for him so wish me luck on either finding out if he changed the location on the web or if he stopped keeping them, talking him into doing it again. The stats really kept things interesting here. More to come as the mystery of the missing website unfolds.

Maybe I better start paying attention to what ever it is that Al Gore has been talking about for the last several years. The skies are blue and the sun is shining. It wasn’t this nice all summer long for crying out loud and here it is January 3rd and the temperature is hovering close to 50 degrees outside. Blame it on El Nino, Global warming or whatever, this just isn’t right. How are we suppose to have our Indian summer or our January thaw when there isn’t anything to thaw out. The lakes haven’t even begun to freeze over yet. It’s so nice even the fish are wearing sun glasses.

May all of you and your families a Happy, Healthy and Prosperous New Year.

For those of you who have been down on luck lately, may it change to only good luck for you.

For those of you that have lost a loved one recently, may the fond memories carry you through the new year and help you deal with your pain and loss.

For those of you struggling financially, May the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow be within reach for you.

For those of you who are depressed and can’t see the light at the end of the tunnel, keep up hope. If you lose hope you lose everything. Don’t ever stop dreaming of what may be ahead for you. If you feel you have lost all hope then talk to someone. Pick up the phone and call a hot-line if you feel you can’t talk to family or friends. Just type in help hotline and your area or state and you will come up with many numbers of people that want to help.

For those of you with loved ones serving our country, May they be safe and come home soon.

For those of you serving our country, Thanks says it all and stay safe.

For those of you in an abusive relationship, Make this the year, better yet make today the day you seek help to end it. Read to see if this you http://www.mayoclinic.com/health/domestic-violence/WO00044 and call the number.

For the snowmobilers, skiers, sledders, plowers, skaters, snowboarders and whoever I missed, may the snow God shine upon you soon.

For my attempt at a mushy New Years greeting, May it never happen again.