Snowfall

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

It snowed last night. That means that when I woke up, the world was blanketed in two inches of soft, white powder. I had, on short notice, agreed to bring my poster in and speak for a student event.

Ordinarily, I walk. Bringing my poster meant driving. In snow.

Newcomers don't understand why Portlanders hate driving in snow. They think that the way the city shuts down is ridiculous, especially the ones who come from those icy northern countries like Nebraska, where it snows ten feet a day every winter, and the winters last eight months. The  thing they don't realize is that there are multiple factors influencing Portland's snow-preparedness. The first, not insignificantly, is that this shit only happens about once every three years, and it usually melts off or evaporates before anyone has to drive in it. For the first 30-odd years of my life, the City of Portland only owned three snowplows. The first response to snow is "ignore it and see if it goes away". Not without reason; it usually does. IF the roads get graveled, it will invariably be too late, after the snow has been packed into ice. And they use pea gravel. The effect on vehicular traction is not unlike throwing ball-bearings on a skating rink.

If people want to live in a city that is prepared for snow, they should move to one where it snows.

I myself have only driven in Portland snow twice, including today. I've driven in the mountains in the winter; that's utterly different. Driving in the snow in Portland is terrifying, and that terror is five parts snow, and eight hundred parts people who came here from somewhere else who think they can drive in snow. They're probably right, but that's irrelevant; the mistake they're making is in thinking that snow in Portland is actually snow. That's an easy mistake to make, but it isn't snow, it's treachery, and it's a lot harder to drive in treachery than it looks like it would be. So they're like "I have my four-wheel-drive SUV and I'm experienced in snow driving" and the thing they don't realize is that it's going to use that against them. And then the next thing they know they've driven into a row of bike racks, a motorcycle, a parked car, and a light post at 5 miles per hour, their SUV is totaled, and they're confused and humbled. Thereafter, they are just as afraid to drive in snow as any good Portlander, because what happened didn't make any sense and they don't understand it so they fear it. Just like the rest of us.

Science tells us that it is this way because the temperature here just isn't cold enough, so the snow packs down into ice on the roads right away and is so close to the melting point that the friction of car tires melts it a tiny bit, making it extraordinarily slippery. My theory is that it's the song of the bridges, the same song that occasionally causes us to have the urge that leaves a lone bicycle leaning against the railing, no rider in sight. We don't mean to, it's just that the siren song rises these urges up in us and before we know it we're on autopilot, climbing over the railing or fighting the impulse to swerve off the bridge.That water vapor rises right up off the rivers and captures some of that song, and then it falls down on us in the winter, the soft pat-pat-pat of the snowflakes masking the song as they fall.

THAT'S the real reason the city shuts down when it snows, and the real reason everyone scurries home, pulls the blinds, and drinks until it passes.

I did get there safely, despite several mildly alarming slides and being stuck behind a guy turning left for several lights because he couldn't seem to get enough traction to get started. When I got to the auditorium, the event was canceled.

[Cardinal Pizza Deliverance.]

See, I like driving in snow. Not because I am a good driver, I'm a shitty driver. But there's something almost therapeutic about taking a several ton vehicle out into the icy wastes and just spinning in circles in an intersection until you puke from the vertigo. It's the perfect metaphor for life. There's no control, no traction, and even if you did pick a direction, it doesn't matter because you probably can't get there the way you planned on anyway so you might as well just roll with it.

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

See, I like driving in snow. Not because I am a good driver, I'm a shitty driver. But there's something almost therapeutic about taking a several ton vehicle out into the icy wastes and just spinning in circles in an intersection until you puke from the vertigo. It's the perfect metaphor for life. There's no control, no traction, and even if you did pick a direction, it doesn't matter because you probably can't get there the way you planned on anyway so you might as well just roll with it.

We don't have the luxury of doing that here because the streets are narrow, old-fashioned-style, and there's no off-street parking so they're lined with cars on both sides.

[Cardinal Pizza Deliverance.]

See, I like driving in snow. Not because I am a good driver, I'm a shitty driver. But there's something almost therapeutic about taking a several ton vehicle out into the icy wastes and just spinning in circles in an intersection until you puke from the vertigo. It's the perfect metaphor for life. There's no control, no traction, and even if you did pick a direction, it doesn't matter because you probably can't get there the way you planned on anyway so you might as well just roll with it.

We don't have the luxury of doing that here because the streets are narrow, old-fashioned-style, and there's no off-street parking so they're lined with cars on both sides.

Spinning around aimlessly is best done in an intersection. Or a parking lot. Narrow streets and poor parking make snow-style bumper cars problematic.

[Salty]

By the time the snow falls all the Others have left, more or less. The Others are here for fun, to brefly run away from their heartache or money problems or legal problems that aren't all that bad. Or snowbirds, or the carbon copy of the same near-geriatric white couple in neon and pastel windbreakers, white hats, and lost disposition.

Most of the happy people fall into one of those catagories.

The rest...the rest of us are survivors, if nothing else. Often nothing else. Eventually survival is all you've got, and the ony reward for survivial is the opportunity to do it again and again and again.

Escape becomes much more perilous once the snow is on the ground here. It means the snow has been on the ground on the ALCANHighway for some time, so that's out. And if you could fly you'd have to leave your house, you'd have to pack things, you'd have to DO SOMETHING. Your tiny, tiny mammal brain cannot possibly handle this on any kind of rational level.

So we that who are left after the snow falls are different from those beautiful snowbirds. We are in no way free like they are. But we know each other. Often in the biblical sense. What else is there to do? That paripheral effect though, it can be a motherfucker.

Especially when you're not very nice at all.

The people left over just stare at you from a distance, and look away as you get close. This is common enough. In some native cultures here it's very disrespectful to look people in the eyes.

All the people who do any different seem to be gone. Must be the weather.

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

It was explained to me as a child that it's disrespectful to look people in the eye. It makes people uncomfortable, of course. It is too intimate, an invasion of their space, an expression of dominance.

Curious how that one, tiny cultural divide can have a crippling effect on someone, because they don't look people in the eye in a society where it's expected. Funny, too, how it can be passed down from generation to generation without saying a word.

I will remember your hair, your smile, your teeth, your chin, the way your cheek is shaped and how the tip of your nose moves when you talk, your hand gestures, your walk, your body language, before I know the color of your eyes.

It was over 20 years before I discovered that the man I am in love with has a wandering eye. I didn't see it until we were in bed together, and I could freely make eye contact because of our intimate situation.

[Suu]

Driving in Portland in the snow sounds exactly like driving in Providence or Boston.

...Except that this is New England and snow is GUARANTEED TO HAPPEN EVERY MONTH FROM NOVEMBER TO MARCH, and there is NO FUCKING REASON WHY people seem to FORGET EVERY FUCKING YEAR how to DRIVE IN IT -OR- why the states of Rhode Island and Massachusetts (except western MA in the mountains) seem to hold off plowing or sanding until it's too fucking late. I'm 87% sure this is the major catalyst as to why I hate snow. The rest has to do with the fact that Providencians have an aversion to de-icing or shoveling of any kind, and I'm a pedestrian, and that it's cold and wet. Shit sucks, I say.

I couldn't even imagine living in a city where they don't get regular amounts of snowfall and having to deal with it and the chaos it causes.    Portland is pretty hilly too, isn't it?

See, I like driving in snow. Not because I am a good driver, I'm a shitty driver. But there's something almost therapeutic about taking a several ton vehicle out into the icy wastes and just spinning in circles in an intersection until you puke from the vertigo. It's the perfect metaphor for life. There's no control, no traction, and even if you did pick a direction, it doesn't matter because you probably can't get there the way you planned on anyway so you might as well just roll with it.

We don't have the luxury of doing that here because the streets are narrow, old-fashioned-style, and there's no off-street parking so they're lined with cars on both sides.

My first winter up here, I spun out on a small bridge. It was my own fucking fault because I didn't have a clue what I was doing, and I took a corner at 40. I handled it though, seeing NASCAR races too many times to know how to counter steer. I have to say I didn't find it all that fun. :/

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

Driving in Portland in the snow sounds exactly like driving in Providence or Boston.

...Except that this is New England and snow is GUARANTEED TO HAPPEN EVERY MONTH FROM NOVEMBER TO MARCH, and there is NO FUCKING REASON WHY people seem to FORGET EVERY FUCKING YEAR how to DRIVE IN IT -OR- why the states of Rhode Island and Massachusetts (except western MA in the mountains) seem to hold off plowing or sanding until it's too fucking late. I'm 87% sure this is the major catalyst as to why I hate snow. The rest has to do with the fact that Providencians have an aversion to de-icing or shoveling of any kind, and I'm a pedestrian, and that it's cold and wet. Shit sucks, I say.

I couldn't even imagine living in a city where they don't get regular amounts of snowfall and having to deal with it and the chaos it causes.    Portland is pretty hilly too, isn't it?

See, I like driving in snow. Not because I am a good driver, I'm a shitty driver. But there's something almost therapeutic about taking a several ton vehicle out into the icy wastes and just spinning in circles in an intersection until you puke from the vertigo. It's the perfect metaphor for life. There's no control, no traction, and even if you did pick a direction, it doesn't matter because you probably can't get there the way you planned on anyway so you might as well just roll with it.

We don't have the luxury of doing that here because the streets are narrow, old-fashioned-style, and there's no off-street parking so they're lined with cars on both sides.

My first winter up here, I spun out on a small bridge. It was my own fucking fault because I didn't have a clue what I was doing, and I took a corner at 40. I handled it though, seeing NASCAR races too many times to know how to counter steer. I have to say I didn't find it all that fun. :/

You guys actually get real snow, though, at colder temperatures, don't you? Like twenties? You probably also get a lot of wet sleety crap because of your proximity to water, and that shit is a bitch. The deal here is that the average winter temperature in our coldest month is around 40 degrees, so we almost never get the prolonged cold dry snow. It is very rare that you see this:



That was 2008. Hasn't happened since. Portlanders ACTUALLY refer to it as "The Snowpocalypse". But you know the thing? I drove in that, it was real snow. It wasn't hard to drive in. Not like the fluffy white lube that fell on Friday. It's fine to drive in snow as long as it agrees to be snow; it's usually just too warm here to do that. Plus, Pandora's Box of "Oh sweet fuck I don't know what happens next... does it all melt off? Or does it change to freezing rain?" at temperatures where it's so slick that if you push on a parked car you can send it sliding down the street like a sled on a hill. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n4qO9GUH-wM So most people play it safe and go the fuck home. But the typical perception from outsiders is that we're just idiots who don't know how to drive in snow... despite the fact that we do it every time we visit the mountains and it's no big deal. Of course, it's always the cocky newcomers who think that THEY can drive in snow who go out and promptly total their cars. It is quite hilly here. There are a few roads up in the West Hills (properly named the Tualitin Mountains but nobody calls them that) which are heated because otherwise they would be impassable when it freezes.

We're having some lows right now though, starting on Friday. All the snow has evaporated now, and it's too cold for more. It got to like 12 last night or something crazy like that. It's around 25-ish now, which is brutal for us tender temperate rainforest people.

[Suu]

The average winter temperature of Providence is actually like 42 degrees. We have this awful flip-flop effect where it will go from 50 to 25, to 32 and heavy snow, to 60, melt, freeze overnight...ad nauseam. The line of OMGFWTFSNOW is actually interstate 495. Once you're north of that, you're out of the protective bubble of RI/Southshore MA and you're fucked forever. This is how Providence can get freezing rain (which is just as painful as it sounds for those that haven't experienced it) and Worcester can get 2 feet of snow and no power for a week with the same storm within 30 miles. The weather here is fucked, but it still gives them no excuse not to sand and plow when it matters. Like tonight, when it's dipping below freezing after the rain starts, which means tomorrow walking to school is going to be death, and I will need crampons.

But like I said, we SHOULD know wtf to do. Portland at least has the excuse of being legit not used to it.

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

Yeah, the thing to do is stay the fuck home. In my opinion, anyway.

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

As long as this thread is now about Providence, I looked up the average winter lows there. Looks like it's around 21 degrees, so it does tend to be quite a bit colder there.

[Suu]

I always do find the weather differences between the NE and NW interesting. Considering by latitude, I think Providence and Portland are about a degree apart, yet the climate because the ocean temps are so vastly different. You would think that the PNW would be typically snowier than it is even further north. I've never been out there, but it seems that there's just generally more moisture out there in the winter than we have.

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

It is very damp largely because it so rarely dips below freezing. That is also the reason we have such a bad black mold problem.

[Suu]

It is very damp largely because it so rarely dips below freezing. That is also the reason we have such a bad black mold problem.

Ugh. That shit's vile.

[The Good Reverend Roger]

As long as this thread is now about Providence, I looked up the average winter lows there. Looks like it's around 21 degrees, so it does tend to be quite a bit colder there.

Thread is always about Providence.  Even when it's about Tucson or Portland or whatever.

One-upmanship is, after all, how we win the internet.