Spectator Sport

I’m frustrated and disappointed with this past storm.  I shouldn’t be, but I am.  As I’ve gotten older I generally don’t complain anymore when a big storm misses us.  I’ll take snow over no snow any day.  However this one was different.  And I’m going to complain.

There is nothing quite like watching your neighbors to the south and east sit under heavy banding of snow for hours while you get the little parasite snow attaching itself for the ride.  The heavy snow is literally right there and yet it just won’t move over you.  It’s the difference between four inches and 14 inches.  Now all you can do is watch as the same areas get blasted over and over again. 

What makes this worse is we knew this band was going to set up somewhere.  We also knew it was going to probably be somewhere around the Philadelphia region.  What makes this a square kick to the groin is how many stations and sites jumped on the big one for our area that morning.  If it wasn’t for these numbers like 8-12 or a foot plus I probably would have been fine.  I don’t claim to be a professional at this but I take pride in having a better than average amount of knowledge.  So when totals are surging for areas including us I have to assume they know something I don’t.  Especially when the storm is practically at our doorstep and totals continue to increase.

Now here is why I shouldn’t be frustrated.  As the night progressed on Monday I decided against original intentions to make a post about the upcoming storm.  I wasn’t planning on it, but I figured it would be good for me to take a look and throw out my two cents.  I’m not sure I could have been anymore accurate especially compared to some others out there.

I could have started and ended the whole post with the paragraph after my 9:55 update.  Let’s dissect.  

First sentence summary:  Heavy precip falls from Baltimore to Philadelphia into central NJ and Long Island.

What happened?  The heavy precip fell from Baltimore to Philadelphia into central NJ and through to Long Island.  The following map illustrates my point.

This is the water equivalent to what fell as snow.  The darker the green the higher the amounts.  It starts at Baltimore, gets much darker through Philadelphia and into central New Jersey before finishing with pockets of green in Long Island.

Second sentence summary:  Lots of double digit snowfalls in SE PA and much of NJ.

What happened?  There were a lot.  And remember the forecast from almost all media outlets was 6-12 inches which means we would all have to be on the high side.  And come to think about it the 6-12 total range is pretty lame.  Think about it this way, that's the same as predicting 1-7 inches.

Third sentence summary:  I dare say somebody hits 14-18 inches.

What happened?  Brookhaven in PA with 14.8 and Manalapan in NJ with 15.8 lead the way in totals.

Predictions:

Allentown 5-8 (Finished with 5.7)

Reading 4-7  (Finished with 4.5) Very questionable - most places around the city were at 6

Philadelphia- Digging out (Finished at 13.5 easily the most for the major cities)

And that's just that one paragraph.  In fact if you read the post above that it's even more oddly accurate.  Like how I wanted to put us in the 4-5 range which is more accurate than what I ended up saying which still was right.  I also said if you look at the pattern this winter it makes sense for Philadelphia to be in the heavy snow.  They were smack dab in the middle.  

Even when I whiffed I hit a home run.  I missed on my AC prediction as they missed the heavy stuff but in the same sentence I said Asbury Park which is in the same county as Manalapan who had the highest reported total in the area.  No reports came from Asbury Park but the second highest total also came from that county.

I guess my point with this is even though I wasn't thrilled with the outcome outside I should be pleased with what I put together.  Not only that but maybe instead of spending all this time focusing on what everybody else is saying and predicting I should consider what I think just as valid.  Because it might not happen often but if anybody had this one pretty damn accurate it included me.