Friday, January 22, 2016

Lots of Snow = Lots of Painting?

The weather mavens are predicting a blizzard of "historical proportions" here in the Chesapeake Bay region with the imminent arrival this afternoon of Winter Storm "Jonas" (queue ominous music) at exactly 3:00pm Eastern standard time today.  I'm not sure when the weather bureau decided to name winter storms like hurricanes but they are so entitled and it surely has nothing to do with ratings for the weather channel.

Anyway, this "storm of the century" is expected to dump >24 inches (that's 61 centimeters for you metric types and 22 stacked 28mm figs for us miniature painting types).  You may sense a bit of irreverence in my tone as we tend to get overly excited about weather related events in the capital region - perhaps it's due to our overgrown sense of importance.  Blizzards can be troublesome for other people, but when it happens to us is a DISASTER!  I've coined a term for our condition "disaster-bating".

Anyway, this one actually looks like it might happen and 24 +/- inches of snow isn't really anything to take lightly plus the forecasted gale force winds (40-50mph) means zero visibility and lots of drifting snow.  Even better is the expectation of thunderstorms with the front which creates a very rare occurrence of "thunder-snow".  All-in-all it should be a interesting show.

Preparations are underway here in the Lair, with the generators being checked, and stockpiles of food laid in.  I also went out and cut some wood so our wood pile is well stocked in case the genny goes down.  More importantly, a case of red wine will be added to the collection to ensure our spirits are properly buoyed as we persevere thought the dark days ahead.  It is a well known scientific-like fact that red wine is really the only known cure for Blizzards.  Hot chocolate only treats the immediate symptoms, but red wine cures the soul.

Every challenging situation does create it's own opportunities and Winter Storm Jonas is no exception.  We'll likely be house bound for 2-3 days which means ample time for painting for the Challenge.  I do need to get into the workshop to cut some lumber for a few planned entries.  That's right, I need some lumber cut on the band saw to complete a few 28mm scale models.  What could it be?  You'll have to wait for the thaw to find out but it's big, really big.

6 comments:

BigLee said...

Good Luck!

We had less than in inch of snow in the South of England last weekend and it prompted a Severe Weather Warning from the Met Office! The snow didn't even last the day before melting away but it still caused traffic chaos across the region. Obviously we have a different kind of snow over here...

TamsinP said...

Fort Sumter in 54mm?

If a few inches of snow is disaster for your capital region, you should see what happens when we get a couple of centimetres here in London. It's like the apocalypse has struck.

Hope the red wine stocks hold up :)

Peter Douglas said...

Miles
OK that's a reasonable frump of snow. Crack open the wine and snuggle in for the weekend. Too bad you shipped your son off to uni, looks like you've got some shovelling yo do and he'd be useful.
Cheers
Peter

Scooby Drew said...

Here in Wisconsin we have a name for that weather system. We call it, "January." :) Enjoy your painting.

jmilesr said...

We have a name for Wisconsin where I live - we call it the Arctic.

:)

El Grego said...

Good luck over there!

On the named storm bit, I noticed this some time ago and also wondered why. Then, as I glanced through a contract with a large multi-national corporation, there was a clause pertaining to the right to declare 'force majeure' due to the events from a 'named storm'. Not sure if it is connected or not... damned lawyers!


Greg