Segacs's World I Know

Posts Tagged ‘weather’

Has it really been 20 years since the infamous Montreal Flood of ‘87″ that flooded homes, buried cars and turned the Decarie Expressway into a river?

And next year will be a decade since Ice Storm ‘98.

How time flies…

I’ve never enjoyed the heat, nor the humidity. Most people I know think I’m crazy, but I’ll happily take a bright, snowy winter wonderland day over a hot, sticky summer sizzler anytime.

The heat has many effects on me, none of them pleasant. Sunburn, dizziness, general lethargy… and laziness. The kind that leads me to sit in a vegetative state in front of the fan, trying not to move, avoiding anything that involves work or even mental exercise.

In case you haven’t figured it out yet, yes, I’m actually trying to justify my lack of blogging by claiming heat exhaustion.

Okay, it’s a lame excuse. But, really, it’s just too hot outside to get all hot and bothered about the news lately. Even though there’s plenty of it to stress about, to be sure. But lately, I can’t help but feel that writing about it is serving no practical purpose other than self-agitation.

Never fear: I’ll be back to my usual ranting and raving self as soon as it cools down a bit. Meanwhile, back to my summer of barbecues, terraces, cold drinks and mental laziness. I highly recommend it.

Hard to believe that less than a week ago, we were wading through a snowstorm in coats and boots. Summer has arrived in full force!

The warm, sunny weather has brought the entire city out from hibernation, literally overnight. The cafés and restaurants have opened their terraces, the bicycles have come out of storage, the parks and streets are full of people shopping, mingling, or simply out enjoying the weather.

It’s always hard to predict exactly when this will happen, but it’s nearly always my favourite time of year, and reminds me how lucky I am to live in possibly the greatest city on earth. Enjoy!

New York State called in the National Guard to Oswego, where they got 141 inches of snow over the past week, and are forecasting more.

In Ohio, snow and ice combined to cause traffic nightmares, travel delays, and the death of a 9-year-old girl.

Meanwhile in Chicago, they got a whopping 8.8 inches of snow… and freaked out. In Oswego, they refer to this as “summer”. It’s all relative.

Here in Montreal, we had temporary amnesia that we’re actually Montrealers, and people massively overreacted to the threat of a snowstorm. Maybe people were afraid we’d get 11 feet of snow, like in Oswego? In any case, the amount of people cancelling plans, closing schools, and panicking over the mere few inches of snow we received is just shameful. It’s just snow, people. We get it every winter. Life goes on.

The skiing should be good this weekend, anyway.

It’s about flippin’ time, too! It’s just not January when you can see the grass.

Woohoo!

Woohoo, first major snowfall of the season! Winter’s here!

I get giddily happy when it snows, so I was dancing around like a little kid most of the day enjoying the weather.

Here are a couple of snapshots:

Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow!

Okay, so it’s not nearly as dramatic as Ice Storm 98. But today’s freezing rain left the trees beautiful but the houses dark.

Driving through the darkened streets was eerie, with a Halloween-like effect as the ice-laden tree branches shone in the reflection of headlights. Dinner with the folks was by candlelight – luckily it was cooked by the time the lights went out. And those with generators are finding that their lights act as beacons to neighbours seeking the use of a stove or a battery charger.

It’s only been a few hours so far, but most people in the dark pockets are already digging in for the long haul, as there’s no word when Loto-Hydro will have things up and running again.

Luckily I seem to still have power (knock wood) so I’m hoping things stay lit and warm here. And the trees really are beautiful; if the ice hasn’t melted off them by tomorrow, I’ll try to get some photos in the daylight.

It’s a beautiful sunny crisp fall day here in Montreal, which makes this all the more surreal:

Buffalo lay all but paralyzed Friday after a record-breaking early snowstorm whited-out the brilliant colors of fall, buried pumpkins and apples and caught this city world-famous for its wintry weather flat-flooted. At least three deaths were blamed on the storm.

The heavy, wet snow snapped tree limbs all over western New York, leaving some 350,000 homes and businesses without power.

A state of emergency was in effect across the region, banning all nonessential travel. Branches and power lines lay draped across cars and houses, and normally busy downtown streets were still, blanketed by up to two feet of snow.

It’s really rare to get any snow at all in October, and when it happens, it hardly ever does more than dust the ground before melting quickly away. And that’s Montreal I’m talking about; for Buffalo, it’s even weirder. For a massive snowstorm of this scale to hit Buffalo at any time of winter is pretty extraordinary, but in mid-October?

I blame Friday the 13th. Hey, it’s as good an explanation as any.

That’s pommes as in apples, not pommies as in Brits, by the way. Which suits me just fine, because it’s apple season and they are incredibly good this year.

And just in time for Rosh Hashanah too. Apples and honey… mmmmm….

It’s also leaf-peeping season, an activity with a comical name but lots of great photo ops. It was a beautiful day today, sunny and clear and hot enough to be mistaken for summer, but with that fabulous fall crispness in the air that just makes it great to be alive. Here are a few pictures from today’s foray out to Parc Saint-Bruno:

Soon enough, it will be winter and we’ll all be grumbling about the cold. In the meantime, let’s all enjoy fall, while it lasts.