<p>Thanks for the report & reassurance, Marite. I really should see that D has your number in her “emergency” bag of tricks.</p>
<p>Garland, I’m a worry-wort: things like newspaper headlines “Bus Carrying Orchestra Slide Off Road.” You shoulda seen the expression on my face when a friend once e-mailed to say, “D arrived in NYC without any problem, despite the storm.” I had no idea that D was even <em>going</em> to NYC…how was I to know which news reports to worry about? I tell ya.</p>
<p>The Dad:</p>
<p>She’ll be fine. The snow isn’t really supposed to hit in Massachusetts until the wee hours of the morning. There won’t be enough snow at midnight to keep your D from getting back to Smith.</p>
<p>They’re predicting 8 - 14" where we are (SE PA ) through tomorrow afternoon. It’s been coming down in big fluffy flakes and looks very pretty- about an inch on the ground already. Fun fact - 36 out of 38 major snow storms have hit our area on a weekend!</p>
<p>Last I heard is that we could get up to 18" in the Greater Boston area with wind chill at 0 degrees tomorrow–it’s now a blizzard warning. We’ll see a few little flakes coming down, but the blizzard won’t start until tomorrow morning and continue until ~3 p.m.</p>
<p>Saw a college student walking down the street today with a “flying saucer.” Guess she’s preparing for the storm in her own way! :)</p>
<p>We were planning to fly from Long Island to Baltimore, listen to D play in a concert, spend Sunday visiting and return in the evening. Plans were cancelled. It was not just the prediction of lots of snow, but high winds. It had better blizzard hard. My W is upset we did not take our chances and go anyway.</p>
<p>TheDad:</p>
<p>I sent you a PM so your D can contact me.</p>
<p>I just hope we won’t have to cancel layout for my school’s newspaper tomorrow, because I just spent 8 hours in the basement of my school working on it, and I’d hate to see all that work go to waste because the articles will be irrelevant by the time we get a chance to publish.</p>
<p>Otherwise I quite like the snow. :)</p>
<p>I’m 20 miles west of Manhattan - snow’s falling but my guess is that we’ll get about 6 to 7 inches tonight and tomorrow. No big deal and it certainly doesn’t look like a blizzard. I think the storm end up further East than the forecasters expected.</p>
<p>I’m here in the tropics – 92F and sunny. My affiliate company in the States however is planning a corporate meeting in Boston on Monday with about a thousand delegates planning to fly in on Sunday. What a nightmare!</p>
<p>My son and his intrepid friends took the train to NYC to attend some musical event. They’re used to weather and I’m sure will have fun in a snowy Manhattan, but I wonder if they’ll have problems with trains on Sunday?</p>
<p>Momrath:</p>
<p>It is early on Sunday and snow is falling in Boston. It is predicted that it will stop in mid-afternoon, so things might not be as disrupted as you fear. Let us hope!</p>
<p>I just looked at a boston webcam and it looked pretty heavy!</p>
<p>But this is from my point of view and where i live we never get snow. What happens at colleges when there is a blizzard? I mean having a dorm full of 100 kids who need to be fed etc, can you go outside at all or is it dangerous? (sorry if this seems a stupid questions, i just was unsure if its just dangerous/impossible for driving etc or if that extended to it being tough to walk next door)</p>
<p>BigGreen–don’t know about you, but we’re well over a foot here, about ten miles west of Manhattan, and still coming down strong! Might be less where you are, though.</p>
<p>BTW, TheD, I don’t blame you for being a worrywart. I would be too. I trust she’s back home and warm by now.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>I think it depends on the exact conditions. A Blizzard means low visibility due to wind and blowing snow and a certain temperature – and it persists for a certain number of hours.</p>
<p>I’m in Connecticut in the middle of this ‘blizzard’. Today, it’s in the mid-20s, I can’t see 200 feet from my house to the pond in the backyard, and we currently have about a foot of snow. If I was at college and needed to walk a few hundred feet to a dining hall, that should be OK. If I had to walk a mile to classes – maybe not. And since the profs don’t generally live on campus, class may be cancelled anyway.</p>
<p>When I lived northwest of Chicago – you could be talking -30 degrees with -70 wind chills and minimal visibility and snowdrifts over my head – probably not ok to plan to do that 200 foot walk to the dining hall. There are stories about the pioneers getting lost walking from the house to the barn 100 feet away. </p>
<p>These storms are predicted however. Contingency plans are made. And the snowstorm doesn’t go on for days. MIght have to skip breakfast, but dinner will be OK.</p>
<p>16 inches (12 on the unpaved roads) here in good old Maryland. Horrible timing -wrecked the school’s winter show, will probably only get us out of one day of school (and it was a half day tomorrow anyway).</p>
<p>From those of us in hurricane land - stay warm, stay dry, check on the elderly neighbors, and be careful shoveling!</p>
<p>Still snowing here in PA - they underestimated it for us. 17 inches on the ground where I am already! Wind chills near 0 and high winds through tomorrow. I’m thinking no school tomorrow. </p>
<p>sid19 - I was in Boston for the huge blizzard in the 70’s that closed down the city for a week. They even postponed Valentine’s Day! It was a state of emergency where we weren’t allowed outside the dorms at all. Food and power weren’t a problem. National guard were out on the streets. I still remember one girl in our dorm had a boyfriend from MIT who walked 12 miles in the blizzard to see her. Not a recommended thing to do - he passed out in the lobby.</p>
<p>Does look like a foot or so in NJ. Debating when to get dressed and start shoveling - detached garage is 150 feet from street. FUN! These are the days when you understand why the Inuits have 35 words for snow - this stuff looks like the light stuff. Another Inuit phrase (I love Google) - kaniktshaq-moritlkatsio-atsuniartoq! = Look at all this f**king snow ! ;-)</p>
<p>“I still remember one girl in our dorm had a boyfriend from MIT who walked 12 miles in the blizzard to see her.”</p>
<p>Love is truly blind!!</p>
<p>We’ve got seven inches where I am in TN and let me tell you, folks around here do not know what to do with snow. School may be out for several days!</p>
<p>Moms, don’t worry about this storm,it is a garden variety noreaster. He in Cambridge/Boston we have about a foot, will probably end up with 18-24" by the end. Kids at colleges in this area will do whatever they do on a Sunday - sleep late, go to the movies, go to the library. This storm is not an emergency, it’s just a big old snow storm, last winter we had half a dozen like this. And because it’s a Sunday, there aren’t the issues of commuting and parking.</p>
<p>When we lived in London, we got one inch of snow. It seemed to paralyze the whole country. H and I decided to go out (having just experienced Midwest winter) and all our neighbors thought we were nuts.</p>
<p>I totally agree with Spikemom. This is a garden variety nor’easter. My street is nicely plowed, you can actually see the cars under the snow. When there is a real snowstorm, you cannot distinguish mounds of snow from parked cars!</p>