It's Sporadically Sunny in Pittsburgh

My husband asked me in January when I was going to write my annual “snow blog.” I guess it’s true that I usually write at least one blog a year complaining about the snow, in addition to my annual post about how I drove myself to the hospital in a snowstorm to give birth.  But there was no need this year.

We had a Mild Winter.  With apologies to my friends and family who welcome the snow for a number of reasons, this made me very, very happy.  There were only a handful of significant snowfalls, and most of those took place on Friday nights.  This allowed us to plan to stay home on Saturday and ride out the storm in just the way I like, that is to say under an afghan with some hot beverage in the comfort of my own home.  It was all pretty civilized.

I helped the situation along by buying a salt spreader to go along with my “snow blower,” which is more of an electric shovel than an actual blower, and really only works when the snow is less than five inches, making it good for one of the two big weekday snowfalls this season.

Now I hate snow so much that it is my policy never to complain about any other kind of inclement weather.  It doesn’t matter what it is.  Extreme temperatures, crazy winds, rain, whatever, bring it on.  Just don’t make me drive in the snow.  This is a good thing because I live in the greater metropolitan Pittsburgh area where we enjoy all the different seasons, sometimes all in the same day.

I have to say though that the weather has been particularly wacky this year, even by Pittsburgh standards. We had 60 degree temperatures in January (and I wasn’t complaining).  We had a stretch of days in March where the temperatures were in the 70’s (and I certainly wasn’t complaining). 

Sometimes the temperatures would drop into the 30’s overnight and soar into the 70’s during the day.  There were days when the sun and the rain took turns coming out, and occasionally overlapped so that it was sunny and rainy simultaneously.  There were many days that I watched the wind blow rain, leaves and other objects sideways past my window at work. One day I swear a small house from Kansas flew by. But I wasn’t complaining.

However, last Sunday, on April 22 (Earth Day, appropriately enough) I heard the weather forecast for the next day.  They were calling for 4 to 6 inches of snow in Western Pennsylvania in LATE April.  Seriously, even after enjoying a mild winter, I never want to see that much snow in late April.  I was in a very, very bad mood even thinking about it.

When the next day came, the westernmost part of the state where I live “dodged the bullet” and didn’t get any snow, but our nearby neighbors just east did get just what they forecast.  I was relieved and grateful for us, and sorry for them.

Some people complained that there wasn’t snow because they were eagerly anticipating a big snowstorm in April.  Others complained about the weather forecast being wrong.  But not me.