Meteorological mayhem.

Wednesday, December 09, 2009 Filed in: My Life, Current Events

Oregon is in the midst of an extreme cold snap. We've set some record low temperatures in the last week, but the situation is supposed to improve this weekend. I hope so; while cold, crisp air is fun for a couple of days, a solid week of this below freezing jazz is getting on my nerves.

How cold? It hit 15 at my house last night, but a lot of areas not far from me were recording low single digits. Yeah, I know that's like spring in North Dakota, but here in Oregon it's just not something we deal with all that often. Only about every 10 years or so, in fact.

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It could be worse - last year about this time we had three feet of snow.

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My drill for the last week has been to go into the shop, turn the heaters on, then go back home for an hour or so. By that time, the shop has heated and I can go to work. The only hitch is that it's too darned cold and windy to even think about going to the range, so I've got several guns to test when next week's warmer temps get here.

That's not as bad as the shop that does my bluing, though - their water pipes froze last week and (naturally) haven't thawed yet. Lack of water means they're shut down for the duration. At least they get a vacation out of this...

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2009 has seen record high temps and record low temps in Oregon. I wasn't terribly fond of global warming last summer when the mercury hit a boiling 112 degrees, but I'd gladly take some of it right now. Fickle, ain't I?

(Hmmm...that's a 97 degree temperature differential for the year. That is definitely a record in my lifetime.)

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On the plus side, there hasn't been a cloud in the sky for a week. While it hasn't gotten above freezing, at least it's been sunny!


-=[ Grant ]=-

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