Category Archives: Weather

Another ‘Walking Dead’ kind of day in the Southland

I had already made the comparison between the recent weather-related apocalypse in Atlanta and “Walking Dead,” but I had somehow missed this post providing photographic evidence.

Whoa. It even includes “survivors” shuffling through the wreckage, in images very like those from everyone’s fave zombie TV show. Check it out. The main visual difference is that in the real-life shots, everything is icy, while it seems like it’s always sweltering summer on “Walking Dead.”

And today, I look out around me, and except for the presence of shuffling undead, this could indeed be the end of all we knew. My iPad just chimed to tell me that “Nearly 52,000 SCE&G customers [are] without power.”

Right now, I’m listening to Nikki Haley’s live briefing. She says T-Rav’s Daddy’s bridge is closed again…

Days such as this remind me of a dream I used to have, decades ago. All you Freudians, prepare to take notes…

I would dream that I was in a house that was seemingly miles from any road or sign of life, with deep, deep snow covering everything. Nothing but whiteness could be seen, for miles and miles of softly undulating, hilly landscape. There were no tracks in the snow. Most of all, there was no sound whatsoever. I was seeing all this not so much from inside the house, as I was seeing the completely snow-bound house set in an all-white background.

The memorable thing about the dream, the thing I wanted to go back to after I awoke, was the utter peacefulness of it. There was nothing to do, and nothing to worry about. Worry and stress was a thing of other times and other places. There was just the snow, and the quiet.

All the Freudians are now going “death wish!” But keep in mind this was in the context of me being a newspaperman. I had to go to work no matter what the weather, and go to great trouble to generate boring weather stories. Sitting tight in a warm house looking at the pretty snow was just not a part of my life.

I think maybe the dream just had to do with wanting a day off like other people. Even though I always scorned those wimps who stayed at home because it was a bit slippery outside, on some level I think I envied them. A perfectly pedestrian impulse. Although I’ll admit there was something mystical, something unearthly, about the peacefulness of that dream.

But I digress…

Here’s an idea for Ravenel’s new reality show

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This was pretty funny — at least, the parts that I could make out through that thick, awful, fake “Gone With the Wind” accent.

Yes, I can see how folks up north — in places “like Vermont, and South Carolina” — might laugh at Southerners’ overreaction to a couple of inches of snow.

But this gives me an idea for an episode of Thomas Ravenel’s new reality TV show, “Southern Charm,” which as I gather is about what happens to scions of old Charleston families in a time of general cultural decline and decadence.

There could be an entire episode in which T-Rav is trapped in his vehicle (possibly a white Escalade, as in this skit) because… wait for it… someone (possibly Yankees) have closed down his Daddy’s bridge on account of snow.

It could work… Hey, maybe it even happened…

Haley versus Deal on handling the snowstorm

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The S.C. Democratic Party rather joyfully brings attention to this item that describes the back-and-forth between Nikki Haley and the office of her counterpart in Georgia, Nathan Deal.

The piece quotes this from the Charleston Regional Business Journal about Nikki’s complaints in a speech to a civic club about the mess in Atlanta:

Haley, who was in Charleston on Tuesday for a speech to members of the Historic Rotary Club of Charleston, said her brother was stuck on an interstate in Atlanta for 27 hours because of the snow and ice.

“While I was trying to fix South Carolina, I was furious at Georgia for not taking care of that,” she said.

She complimented South Carolina’s Department of Transportation, Department of Public Safety and other law enforcement agencies, as well as the state’s National Guard, for their work during the storm.

“When you go through a storm, whether it’s a hurricane or winter storm, our team stands ready,” Haley said. “I am very proud of team South Carolina and the way they handled the storm.”…

And then it provides this response from the Georgia governor’s office:

Deal spokesman Brian Robinson offered this when confronted with Haley’s jab:

“To say South Carolina did a better job responding to the storm than Georgia is like saying Tennessee did a better job than Louisiana responding to Hurricane Katrina. We experienced completely different weather events.”

Nasty weather leads to blood shortage — so GIVE!

2014 Winter Weather Wimp Award goes to… SC Legislature

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Aiee! A snowflake! Run away; run away! /Flickr photo by Pen Waggener

Dang, I hate it when this happens!

This morning over breakfast, I saw a Tweet that said the Legislature was canceling the whole week’s sessions because of “the possibility of snow,” or “the probability of inclement weather,” or something along those lines.

So on my way to my laptop, I came up with Winter Weather Wimp Award, and I dug the alliteration (especially that sneaky last “W” in “Award”), and I couldn’t wait to sit down, go grab that Tweet, and mercilessly mock it.

And I can’t find it. Either I misremembered it, or someone realized how ridiculous it sounded and took it down.

But in any case, the Legislature is shutting down for the whole week, even though not a flake has fallen.

So I’m giving them the award anyway. They earned it. And there was plenty of competition. Why, even the U.S. Army has surrendered at the threat of a flake — most of Fort Jackson will be closed.

And to think, just over 69 years ago (wow — has it been that long?), the U.S. Army was living in frozen foxholes in the Ardennes during the coldest European winter on record, and a previously unsuspected German army just rolled right over the 106th Infantry Division (capturing both my father-in-law and Kurt Vonnegut)… but did the Army quit? No. They cut off the advance and knocked the remaining Nazis right back into Germany, fighting them and the ice and snow at the same time.

That’s when men were men, even with frozen toes. Of course, I must confess, it was before my time. Me, I’ve got my L.L. Bean snow boots out in the truck, waiting to put them on and go crunching through the snow when it arrives, pretending that I’m hardy and indomitable…

Do some people really not feel the cold?

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First the news: I stopped in at the Vista Starbucks this morning and did not buy any coffee.

I just wanted to see if they had any pound bags of Christmas blend beans left, which they did not.

Anyway, as I was turning into Lincoln from Gervais, I had to wait for a pedestrian couple to cross Lincoln in front of me, and I found myself staring at the man, who was wearing shorts and a T-shirt. This wasn’t some stupid kid showing off how the elements didn’t bother him; it was a middle-aged guy. Yes, he was well over six feet tall and probably weighed around 300 lbs., but still — even at that size, doesn’t a body give off too much heat to walk around thus unprotected when it’s 42 degrees out?

Then inside, waiting in the queue to ask about the Christmas blend, a skinny young guy in front of me ordered iced coffee.

I’m telling myself that the man is one of those guys who inexplicably always wears shorts and T-shirts (and what’s that about — this fashion of grown men dressing like little boys?), and has nothing else in his closet, which serves him well much of the year in SC. And the kid, being an American, always drinks iced drinks, and it never occurs to him to order anything else.

Because the idea that these were conscious decisions is just too absurd…

Nice timing there, global warming researchers

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I like the touch with the melting Earth, don’t you?

I had to smile this morning when I saw this story on the front page of The State, under the headline, “Climate change research: Southeast will swelter:

Poisoned seafood, scorched forests, flooded homes and crumbling bridges are just some of the problems the Southeast can expect as the earth’s climate changes and temperatures heat up in future decades, according to a study released Tuesday.

The 341-page report, based on the expertise of more than 100 scientists and researchers, is considered the most comprehensive study to date of how global warming is affecting the South – and what Southerners can expect…

I don’t know about you, but I was rather startled to learn, about 10 last night, that it was snowing outside in my yard. As also reported today in The State, under the headline, “Unusual November snow falls on Columbia.” And this morning, I almost, but not quite, wore my coat that I got for a winter trip to England three years ago, which I’ve only worn about twice since then. And when I got outside, I regretted that I had decided not to wear it.

Yeah, I know, the study’s about long-term trends, etc. But still, not great timing. Earlier in the day, it had been what? 70 or so? And then there were all those high winds as I was driving home last night, and behind them — snow.

It’s like somebody up there really didn’t like these researchers…

Joe Wilson accused of disaster hypocrisy

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… or at the very least, inconsistency.

I’m not going to quote the whole thing because of the language that he used, but here’s part of what someone named Jonathan Valania had to say about Joe Wilson’s vote against Sandy relief last week:

… this despite the fact that South Carolina has had 13 major disaster declarations and two emergency declarations in the last 30 years, according to the Federal Emergency Management Agency. The worst storm to ever hit the Palmetto State, Hurricane Hugo back in 1989, caused over $13 billion in damage and left nearly 60,000 people homeless.

Guess who picked up the tab?

And back in 2003 when the South Carolina suffered through a severe drought, all 46 counties in the Palmetto State were declared federal disaster zones at Wilson’s urging. In 2005, he voted for a $10.5 billion Katrina relief package.

“The compassion, generosity, and solidarity of the American people during difficult times are one of our most cherished blessings as citizens of our great nation,” Wilson said after the Katrina relief bill passed the House. “As we now face the severity of this historic natural disaster, Americans must do what we do best: help each other.”...

That was then and this is now.

Indeed. That was before the Tea Party, and before Joe decided he must do its will. And this is now, after Joe has followed the Four Freshman (OK, so now it’s Three Sophomores) through the looking glass.

Romney campaign, other Republicans still blaming Christie

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Gov. Christie on SNL over the weekend.

There’s an interesting NYT story today about how Chris Christie got a chilly reception at the Republican Governor’s Association meeting in Vegas. It also goes into just how much the Romney campaign people blame him for their loss. Some experts:

But in the days after the storm, Mr. Christie and his advisers were startled to hear from out-of-state donors to Mr. Romney, who had little interest in the hurricane and viewed him solely as a campaign surrogate, demanding to know why he had stood so close to the president on a tarmac. One of them questioned why he had boarded Mr. Obama’s helicopter, according to people briefed on the conversations.

It did not help that Mr. Romney had not called Mr. Christie during those first few days, people close to the governor say.

The tensions followed Mr. Christie to the annual meeting of the Republican Governors Association in Las Vegas last week. At a gathering where he had expected to be celebrated, Mr. Christie was repeatedly reminded of how deeply he had offended fellow Republicans.

“I will not apologize for doing my job,” he emphatically told one of them in a hotel hallway at the ornate Wynn Resort…

Inside the Romney campaign, there is little doubt that Mr. Christie’s expressions of admiration for the president, coupled with ubiquitous news coverage of the hurricane’s aftermath, raised Mr. Obama’s standing at a crucial moment.

During a lengthy autopsy of their campaign, Mr. Romney’s political advisers pored over data showing that an unusually large number of voters who remained undecided until the end of the campaign backed Mr. Obama. Many of them cited the storm as a major factor in their decision, according to a person involved in the discussion.

“Christie,” a Romney adviser said, “allowed Obama to be president, not a politician.”…

Gee, folks, do you think it could be, as this story suggests, something as simple as the fact that Obama was taking an interest in what was happening in New Jersey, and his opponent was not?

The Obama-Christie mutual admiration society

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The kind words flowed both ways today between the governor of New Jersey and the POTUS:

President Obama stood shoulder-to-shoulder with Chris Christie, the Republican governor of New Jersey, on Wednesday afternoon, providing reassurance after Hurricane Sandy — and a politically powerful picture of bipartisanship…

“He has worked incredibly closely with me since before the storm hit,” Mr. Christie said, with Mr. Obama standing just behind him. “It’s been a great working relationship.”…

Mr. Obama was equally effusive, saying that Mr. Christie, “throughout this process, has been responsive.”

“He’s been aggressive,” the president continued, “in making sure” that the state was prepared in advance of the storm.

“I think the people of New Jersey recognize that he’s put his heart and soul” into the recovery after the storm. “I just want to thank him for his extraordinary leadership and participation.”…

Only one thing marred the blossoming of this beautiful friendship: When they were flying together over Point Pleasant Beach, they saw someone had written “ROMNEY” in large letters in the sand…

Gov. Chris Christie’s effusive praise of Obama

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Here’s something you don’t see every day:

Gov. Chris Christie of New Jersey took an unscheduled break from partisan attacks on the President Obama on Tuesday to praise him, repeatedly and effusively, for leading the federal government’s response to the storm.

“Wonderful,” “excellent” and “outstanding” were among the adjectives Mr. Christie chose, a change-up from his remarks last week that Mr. Obama was “blindly walking around the White House looking for a clue.”

Some of Mr. Christie’s Republican brethren have already begun grumbling about his gusher of praise at such a crucial time in the election.

But the governor seemed unconcerned. When Fox News asked him about the possibility that Mitt Romney might take a disaster tour of New Jersey, Mr. Christie replied:

I have no idea, nor am I the least bit concerned or interested. I have a job to do in New Jersey that is much bigger than presidential politics. If you think right now I give a damn about presidential politics, then you don’t know me.

A governor who cares more about serving his (or her) state more than national partisan politics? Imagine that. If you live in South Carolina, you might find that difficult, but try…

Is Hurricane Sandy God’s ‘October Surprise’?

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And if so, which candidate does he want to benefit?

Nate Silver is worrying about Sandy, and not just because he lives in Brooklyn:

I’m not sure whether I render the greater disservice by contemplating the political effects of a natural disaster — or by ignoring the increasingly brisk winds whipping outside my apartment in Brooklyn. Still, I thought it was worth giving you my tentative thoughts on how Hurricane Sandy might affect the runup to next Tuesday’s election.

We may see a reduction in the number of polls issued over the coming days. The Investor’s Business Daily poll has already announced that it will suspend its national tracking poll until the storm passes, and other cancellations may follow. And certainly, any polls in the states that are most in harm’s way, including Virginia, New York, New Jersey, Delaware, Maryland and Pennsylvania, will need to be interpreted with extreme caution…

But beyond the polls that Silver lives by, what about the election itself?

The aftermath of Katrina did enormous damage to public perception of President Obama’s predecessor. What will happen in those blue states that will bear the brunt of this storm, and how quickly will it happen?

Will this be a chance to show political leadership that will enhance the incumbent’s chances, or will it inevitably cause a bad taste that accrues to Mr. Romney?

The Washington Post has put together this interesting explainer on “five places where Hurricane Sandy could affect the election.” Interesting. A snowstorm in conservative southwest Virginia keeping people from the polls? Whoa.

Meanwhile, the Obama team is shrugging everything off and declaring their victory inevitable. The other side is pumping out some hubris, too, saying in a memo: “Every day, Barack Obama’s so-called Ohio firewall crumbles a little bit more because of Mitt Romney’s electric appearances, our campaign’s robust ground game, and Romney’s forward-looking message that lays out a serious and specific agenda for the future.”

Electric appearances? Really?

Nikki Haley still to speak (I’m sure all of y’all will be greatly relieved to know it)

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At first it appeared that planet Earth had gone to great trouble to prevent Nikki Haley from addressing the nation. But the GOP convention planners, not ones to take a hint, have rescheduled her:

TAMPA, Fla. — Gov. Nikki Haley will address the Republican National Convention at nearly 10 p.m. Tuesday under the new, storm-altered schedule of events.

The governor was originally slated to speak at 10 p.m. tonight, but Tropical Storm Isaac forced organizers to scrap the opening night activities and move the Monday night speakers to Tuesday.

Haley, who made history as the state’s first female and minority governor, will follow Artur Davis, a former Alabama Democrat and supporter of President Obama who became a Republican this year after badly losing his bid to become Alabama’s first black governor.

She will speak before GOP presidential candidate Mitt Romney’s wife, Ann, and another popular Republican governor, Chris Christie of New Jersey, according to the revised schedule. Christie was supposed to deliver the keynote speech Monday night…

So I’m sure all of y’all are relieved, right?

D.C. wimps can’t handle FAMOUSLY Hot…

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This morning on Twitter, The Washington Post whined that “Today is going to be very hot in D.C.”

I followed the link. You know what they think is “very hot?”

They were expecting it to be between 97 and 102. (OK, actually it turned out to be 104 there; but that wasn’t what was forecast this morning.) Really. What we would consider to be middlin’ warm here in Famously Hot Columbia, SC. A good day for seersucker, perhaps, but no use complaining…

So I reTweeted that, adding the message, “Oh, yeah? Well, it’s going to be 107 here, you wimps…”

As it turns out, I was being modest, as you can see from the actual screenshot from my phone this afternoon.

Earlier, on NPR, I had heard someone marveling over how hot it was supposed to be in various places across the country. No mention of Columbia. And none of the forecasts cited were as hot as it was supposed to get here.

Did it hail like this where you were?

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Just now thought to put up this video from over the weekend. You can’t see the hailstones — about half an inch in diameter, I’d say — bouncing off my driveway as well as I’d like, but you should be able to hear it.

Does everything come in twos now?

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Above you see the rather startling double rainbow over Columbia last evening, shot through one of the front windows of Yesterday’s. Below you see the more earthbound view from several moments earlier.

The gray Jetta across the river — I mean, street — belongs to my daughter-in-law. I had invited her and my son and youngest granddaughter to Five Points for dinner last night. As we were eating, we were aware of how hard the rain was falling outside. Then, we noticed a crowd gathering to look out the the window. Was there a fire?

I went to check, and got the pictures. And yes, their car was flooded. Which makes me feel pretty bad, since if I hadn’t asked them out, their car would have been high and dry in their driveway.

We had to take them home — the parking lot was high enough to be out of the floodwaters, and that’s where my Buick was. Then we had to bring my son back for the bailing. The car started, but it’s saturated.

As you’ll recall, this is the second time in three days that a car belonging to a member of my family has been drenched by the chronic floods of Columbia. (My wife’s car started after the flood receded, but there’s still water squelching under the carpet, and it started to smell over the weekend. We kept trying to sop up the water and air it out, but it kept raining.)

My eldest daughter (unlike me, a Columbia resident) said last night, “I’m not someone who normally says this, but what am I paying taxes for?”

Indeed. I saw Cameron Runyan this morning and advised him, “Here’s a city issue for you.”

This is totally unacceptable. As we were leaving, we saw the business owners fighting the water in their shops. Shoes were floating around in a shoe store. Lights were on everywhere on this Sunday night.

Five Points is a gem for Columbia. But it’s kind of hard to keep a business going when there are whitecaps in the street.

It wasn’t just Five Points last night, of course. I saw someone else stalled in Shandon after the waters receded. And state GOP Executive Director Matt Moore Tweeted this, at about the time I Tweeted out the double rainbow:

Water 6 feet deep on Leesburg Rd, in@columbiasc #sctweetshttp://yfrog.com/h8ba7gcj

That’s no everyday occurrence — or rather, it shouldn’t be. That kind of flooding in Louisiana inspired Randy Newman to write this wonderful song 50 years later:

The river rose all day
The river rose all night
Some people got lost in the flood
Some people got away alright
The river have busted through clear down to Plaquemines
Six feet of water in the streets of Evangeline…

Let me leave you with a theological question: If one rainbow means it’s not going to flood any more, is a double rainbow a double guarantee? Or is it a toggle sort of thing: One the promise is on; two it’s off? Is it like adding positive three to negative three, so you end up at zero?

In Columbia, I fear that may be the case.

The Great White North

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Travel has distracted me the last couple of days. I’ve been exploring the frozen wastes north of the Mason Dixon line, expecting at any moment to run into Peary or Byrd or Shackleton or somebody.

They got those people off the Interstate not far from here. The Turnpike has pretty much been open all along. As one cynical local sage told me, "They’ll never let the Turnpike close. It’s a toll road.

Good thing, too, because I’m using it today to drive to the airport and get back home.

I’ve missed Obama, but not Hillary. I’ll try to catch up tomorrow. No column today. I wrote one before I left, but decided that Cindi’s column was better for Sunday.

So, take off, eh?

Demint_043

Is God telling us something?

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As we’ve all come to learn from bitter experience, the worst place to be when a hurricane strikes is just to the right of the eye as it comes ashore. That’s where the greatest force and the highest storm surge hit, because at that point you’re dealing with not only the head-on circular speed of the counter-clockwise winds, but the forward momentum of the storm itself (at least I think that’s why; any more weather-savvy people out there are invited to correct me).

Conversely, if you’ve got to be within the radius of such a storm, the “best” place to be is to the left of the eye, because that way you just get the hurricane’s “backhand” as it is moving in a direction opposite that of the wind.

Thus Hugo hit McLellanvile harder than it did Charleston, and Katrina slammed little towns in western Mississippi harder than it did New Orleans (not that that was much comfort to New Orleans once the Lake Pontchartrain levee broke).

So it struck me as interesting, looking at the map we ran
on the front page this morning, to see the way Rita had shifted course. Galveston and Houston were able to breathe a little easier, as it looked as though they might get the backhand now, when the opposite had seemed likely earlier. But in shifting course to the east, the greatest force of the storm was now projected to hit the greatest concentration of oil refineries in the region.

Is God trying to tell us something? Is He giving us a more direct hint — since we haven’t taken the earlier ones, which were none too subtle (9/11, Katrina) — that maybe, just maybe, we ought to be thinking about a serious energy policy? One in which we pursue alternative sources of power for all we’re worth while conserving like crazy and in the meantime (as long as we’re still relying on some oil) looking for other places to get and process oil domestically besides the Gulf Coast?

Maybe. But before I make too big a deal about this in theological terms, let’s wait and see where the storm actually does come ashore…

Feb. 1	9:00 a.m.-2:00 p.m.	Jack Oliver’s Pool and Patio3303 Forest Dr.Columbia, SC 29204
Feb. 4	11:00 a.m.- 4:00 p.m.	University of South Carolina-College of NursingRussell HouseColumbia, SC 29208
Feb. 5	7:00 a.m.-5:00 p.m.	Palmetto Health Richland Medical Center3301 Harden St.Columbia, SC 29203
Feb. 5	10:00 a.m.-3:00 p.m.	Meadow Glen Elementary School510 Ginny LaneLexington, SC 29072
Feb. 5	10:00 a.m.-3:00 p.m.	Department of Motor Vehicles10311 Wilson Blvd.Blythewood, SC 29016
Feb. 6	10:00 a.m.-3:00 p.m.	Palmetto Health Home Care1400 Pickens St.Columbia, SC 29202
Feb. 6	9:00 a.m.-3:00 p.m.	Dreher High School701 Adger RoadColumbia, SC 29205
Feb. 7	8:30 a.m.-2:30 p.m.	Pelion High School600 Lydia Dr.Pelion, SC 29123
Feb. 10	4:00 p.m.-9:00 p.m.	County Emergency Medical SVC407 Ball Park RoadLexington, SC 29073

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