All Things Bubba

It's been crazy warm this year, but today, it finally snowed. The first snowfall is usually around Thanksgiving, but it was a little late. Snow was predicted a couple of times in November, but never materialized.

I checked the weather last night, because I was planning to go shopping this morning. It said that the snow wouldn't start until afternoon. Well, they blew that one. I woke up, and it had already started during the night. Everything was white.

It didn't look too bad, but the roads were treacherous. Partly because the snowplow guys were taken by surprise and weren't up yet, partly because it was the first snow of the year, and people were either driving like maniacs or were being super-cautious, crawling along at a snail's pace.

Seagulls in the snowy parking lot of the grocery store.
It really started coming down while I was in the grocery store. It was 18F, and the snow had melted and refrozen on my warm car windshield while I was shopping. I had to scrape the ice off.

Bags of road salt, waiting to be used.
The drive home was nasty. The traffic was heavier, because it was later, and the roads were worse. I was skidding all over the place. I live on top of a pretty steep hill, and usually they keep it well plowed and salted, but not today. I had to shift into low gear to get up it.

Still, it was very pretty. In a few weeks, I will doubtless be sick of snow, but today, it was kind of neat.

My neighbors' summer furniture and Halloween pumpkin getting covered with snow.

The old-timers around here claim that winters are warmer and drier than they used to be. The autumn leaves aren't as bright, because it doesn't get cold enough. Many birds no longer migrate. (Though that might be because people feed them.)

And the NY Times thinks global warming may mean no more baseball bats:

RUSSELL, Pa. — Careers at stake with each swing, baseball players leave little to sport when it comes to their bats. They weigh them. They count their grains. They talk to them.

But in towns like this one, in the heart of the mountain forests that supply the nation’s finest baseball bats, the future of the ash tree is in doubt because of a killer beetle and a warming climate, and with it, the complicated relationship of the baseball player to his bat.

Well, I guess there's always maple...