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Cold, damn cold
06 March 2007
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Sixty degrees celsius. That's 140 degrees fahrenheit for those of you still in my generation's learning path. That's the change in temeprature since I returned from Mexico. Actually some days it was closer to 70 degrees C, about 158 F.
Two weeks ago, I was walking the streets or strolling the beach at 30-34C under the cloudless mid-day sun. Last night, at home here on the frigid southern shore of Georgian Bay, the temperature dropped to -26C, with a wind-chill factor of -36C.
That's face-hurting cold. That's so cold your cheekbones and eyebrows ache, your eyes hurt, the tops of your ears go numb.
The lake is 300 miles long and the northern winds race down here unimpeded, picking up speed until they reach landfall: Collingwood. And yesterday they did so with a vengeance, ripping like an icy knife into the town.
The extra chill was because of the wind. Yesterday the winds picked up gusts of up to 90 km/h (55 mp/h), but almost constantly blowing in the 30-45 km/h range. Add onto that several centimetres of snow that were carried horizontally with the wind, it was not unlike being in the Antarctic yesterday.
No, that's not me in the photo. It's Scott in the Antarctic. yesterday I felt like him, though, although not in this photo - a little later, say about the time he walked out of his tent to freeze to death in the storm. Even Scoop at the EEU had a comment to make on the weather (and a local pic of the downtown taken during what must have been one of the more clement moments).
Visibility was rather too often limited to the length of a car. The parking lot in front of my store periodically vanished in a wall of white. Power went out in several areas (including my business) where the winds tore down electrical wires, or pushed trees into them. There were frequent reports on the radio of vehicle accidents everywhere in the area, and it was worse south of us.
Several highways were closed - most of those into town were simply impassable, so businesses ground down because there were few deliveries, and no courier deliveries or pickups. I went to get tea for myself and the staff at a Starbucks, a block away and by the time I returned, the near-boiling tea had cooled considerably. I was shivering, in part because of an incipient cold that just started to break over me this weekend.
This morning has dawned much calmer, but still cold. Minus 20C, with a wind-chill between-38C and -32C. It will reach a balmy -15C today, but more snow is on the way and at night the temperature will fall to -19C. No wonder animals hibernate!
So if you ask me, "How was your vacation?" I will tell you that from the vantage of this ice-rimed northern vista, it seems like a distant paradise and spring cannot arrive any time too soon for me.
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Two weeks ago, I was walking the streets or strolling the beach at 30-34C under the cloudless mid-day sun. Last night, at home here on the frigid southern shore of Georgian Bay, the temperature dropped to -26C, with a wind-chill factor of -36C.
That's face-hurting cold. That's so cold your cheekbones and eyebrows ache, your eyes hurt, the tops of your ears go numb.
The lake is 300 miles long and the northern winds race down here unimpeded, picking up speed until they reach landfall: Collingwood. And yesterday they did so with a vengeance, ripping like an icy knife into the town.
The extra chill was because of the wind. Yesterday the winds picked up gusts of up to 90 km/h (55 mp/h), but almost constantly blowing in the 30-45 km/h range. Add onto that several centimetres of snow that were carried horizontally with the wind, it was not unlike being in the Antarctic yesterday.
No, that's not me in the photo. It's Scott in the Antarctic. yesterday I felt like him, though, although not in this photo - a little later, say about the time he walked out of his tent to freeze to death in the storm. Even Scoop at the EEU had a comment to make on the weather (and a local pic of the downtown taken during what must have been one of the more clement moments).
Visibility was rather too often limited to the length of a car. The parking lot in front of my store periodically vanished in a wall of white. Power went out in several areas (including my business) where the winds tore down electrical wires, or pushed trees into them. There were frequent reports on the radio of vehicle accidents everywhere in the area, and it was worse south of us.
Several highways were closed - most of those into town were simply impassable, so businesses ground down because there were few deliveries, and no courier deliveries or pickups. I went to get tea for myself and the staff at a Starbucks, a block away and by the time I returned, the near-boiling tea had cooled considerably. I was shivering, in part because of an incipient cold that just started to break over me this weekend.
This morning has dawned much calmer, but still cold. Minus 20C, with a wind-chill between-38C and -32C. It will reach a balmy -15C today, but more snow is on the way and at night the temperature will fall to -19C. No wonder animals hibernate!
So if you ask me, "How was your vacation?" I will tell you that from the vantage of this ice-rimed northern vista, it seems like a distant paradise and spring cannot arrive any time too soon for me.
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Is it April yet?