AJC > Sandy Springs > Blog > Archives > 2008 > January > 28 > Entry
DEL.ICIO.USLet’s cancel winter
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
I know we need the precipitation, and I know that I’m the last person who needs to have a hint of dominion over nature, but this recent run of snow, sleet and ice needs to end. Now.
Can we please cancel the rest of winter and move to early spring? It doesn’t need to get into the 60s, just keep things around 38 or so until March.
In the past week we’ve had snow twice and as this is being written the forecast is for freezing rain and maybe some bridges icing up. And I know we need wet stuff falling from the sky, but let’s face facts for those of us living in Sandy Springs - we’re not cut out to deal with this.
Just look what we do when the first few flakes of snow fall. Everyone goes into red-alert mode, rushing to the grocery store. And what do we buy? Milk, bread, peanut butter and beer. Now, I get the first three. If you lose power for a day or so you can make do with sandwiches and milk.
But beer? Do you think downing a few cold ones is going to make that ice storm more manageable? And in my wildest days I never washed down a peanut-butter sandwich with beer. Are you starting to see why I believe we don’t react well to frozen precip?
And while we’re having this chat, let’s talk about winter-weather driving skills. We have none. In part this has to do with the fact we don’t have to drive in snow and ice enough to learn how to deal with it, thank the Lord.
But when the ice does come some well-meaning newsreader will tell us how to maneuver our cars if we hit a sheet of ice. People, I’ve been driving in this town my whole life and we still haven’t mastered right-turn-on-red on Roswell Road - much less how to navigate in hockey rink conditions.
But I still hear people say: “I know how to drive when it get icy.” These are the same people who later ask: “Can you recommend a good body shop?”
No, my fellow Sandy Springsteens, let us take a page from Gov. Perdue’s book and appeal to a higher authority. Any higher authority you choose. Rain, yes. Rain chilled into any form but liquid, no.
Permalink | Comments (5) | Post your comment | Categories: Jim Osterman
Comments
By DB
January 29, 2008 7:30 AM | Link to this
ROFL! I laughed so hard last week at the Full Alert Media Blitz of the Coming Snow!! We got — what? 2 inches, max? This South’n gal spent a few years in Connecticut, and let me assure you, 2 inches and 33 degrees is almost considered a nice spring day, there! (ok, maybe a little exaggeration, but not much.)
The last ice storm we had a couple of years ago was a great chance for us to take our then-16 year old new driver down to the shopping center parking lot and practice braking and skidding. We spent about an hour and half braking, feeling the car skid, and experimenting with different ways to recover. At the end, he said that the first few times he did it, he panicked, but by the end, he was a lot more confident about how he reacts, and, more important, he was MUCH for knowledgeable about how the car acts on ice. (“Who knew a car could slide that far by itself?!”) Even though he’d had physics, he still hadn’t quite grasped the practical execution of mass plus direction equals velocity!
If I tend to stay home during these weather blips, it’s not because I am uncertain with my driving skills. It’s because I mistrust 99% of the other folks out there, who don’t increase the space between cars to compensate for increased braking distances and who think that slowing down is a sign of weakness.
By MarkG
January 29, 2008 12:59 PM | Link to this
You’re no Steve Rose. Don’t quit your day job.
By GrateDane2
January 29, 2008 1:12 PM | Link to this
What is it with you fellow southerners and winter? I was born here and love the cold and occasional white stuff. Heaven knows we get enough of the hazy heat and humidity from April through October. So, chill out; enjoy a book in front of a cozy fire. Your precious summer will be here soon enough.
By Susan
January 30, 2008 12:15 PM | Link to this
You go GrateDane2! This fellow southerner agrees! Hot and Humidity will be here soon enough! Enjoy these chilly temps. In a few months, you will all be wishing it was cold again! Beside, cold temps are much better on hot flashes :)
By Vicki
February 3, 2008 12:09 PM | Link to this
Speaking of canceling winter, thank you for today’s My View in which you bring reason to the issue of filling our pools. I got the same email from our council member asking us to push for a pool-filling exemption in Sandy Springs. I’m afraid I was so utterly floored by the whole idea of asking for an exemption that my reply to her was less than reasoned and reflected the emotions I felt about the possibility that we might get the exemption, “for the health of our children”.
I wonder how many people really don’t get that the lakes are drying and our water availability is at-risk. As I step in between the buckets in my shower, placed there to collect water to sustain outdoor plants, I don’t want to imagine that Sandy Springs gets their exemption, “for the children”. Talk about a lost “teachable moment”. As they play on dry land this summer, maybe kids will find an opportunity to think about waste and conservation and ways to solve problems that they will inherit.