The National Weather Service revised its forecast and warning verbiage during the day yesterday. We'd been under a Winter Storm Warning for the day and they reduced it to an advisory. The night passed at our home with no more than about a half-inch of new snow falling. It got really cold –about 10 degrees– overnight and the wind switched. So now, in the absence of an official Storm, we are getting buried under gobs of lake effect snow courtesy of the cold winds blowing over the open waters of Lake Erie! I made it to work without incident but the drives, streets, and highways were very treacherous — much more hazardous than last night's drive during the Warning hours! I had to come to work for my night shift. [sigh]
In the pre-dawn hours this day snow fell lightly. Soon it changed to light rain dripping from the low clouds on to ground and objects chilled to below-freezing temperatures. Pretty much everything received a thin coat of ice making for a hazardous commute for people driving to work. Me? It was a day off for me… I worked my weekend rotation last week and this day off was comp time!
After It stopped raining I ventured outdoors to clear out the seed-catching trays from our bird feeders. The trays were blocked by ice and seed shells and, with rain expected, needed to be emptied to be clean.
It's looking like we won't be making our own holiday cards this year. I'd picked out an image –ivy in a snowy setting– but it was judged not "just right" for a card. {sigh} Shown here is that image, which I like very much, recorded in Chagrin Falls, Ohio, during a November 22 visit. There's still one more photo that may please us both, but precious little time remaining to make and send cards. Sorry!
As I arrived at work the sky was darkening. Bright streaks of lightning connected clouds and ground. It was going to be an interesting morning! Soon after I entered the building the rains came. The intense downpour flooded the court garden and began to come into the building under the doors. We got about three inches of rain in around an hour! Then the lights clicked off and on… more than once… for about a second each time… deadly to computers! The recently-rebuilt server went down and stayed down twice — an indication that its backup power supply (UPS) had failed. After the second system stop I shut off the old UPS and moved the computer's power connections to a neighboring, known-good UPS. The usual glitches developed around the building; things that happen when the power is interrupted. There was only one PC fatality. Apparently the computer was booting up during one of the brief outages and a Windows file was corrupted. I hope I can repair the OS damage tomorrow without a full reinstall. Then Finance descended upon me: Inventory time! That led to a culling of obsolete and broken equipment for sale and disposal. Most of the stuff is of very little value and the costs associated with staff time will far exceed any money brought in by the sale of that crap. Policy rules, however: So it is written, so it shall be done.
Mom-in-Law needs more time in the hospital {duh!} and will be staying there a couple more days. She officially needs more time to recoup from the surgeries and be evaluated for post-hospital care {duh! and duh!}. Whew! I suppose even older folk vary as to how quickly they recover from any given medical procedure. But this sweet, frail elderly woman just showed no potential for going home the day after having her procedures. So good sense did prevail in the end and Mom-in-Law is staying in hospital where she belongs.
Late-Night P.S. — We had more storms tonight. While at home we had heavy rain around 8:30 or so with nearly constant lightning. Very impressive! As the storm (we were at the edge of a line of more powerful storms that swept through) passed, I looked out the west window. What should I see but clouds lit by occasional flashes of lightning and a large clearing at the fringes of the maelstrom. And in that clearing a star shown.
PhotonStopper 