There's nothing to talk about but the weather
Last night Merrill's low temp was -32°! That's not even factoring in wind chill, that's just straight air temp: -32°! Do you know how cold that is? It's so cold that it's almost the same temperature in both Celsius and Fahrenheit! I think the saying needs to be written "March comes in like a Polar Bear." No, that's not mean enough. How 'bout "March comes in like a windigo". Yeah. That feels about right.
We are consistently 20 to 30 degrees BELOW average. According to the news, in the 90-day "meteoritical winter" that just was, we only had 6 days that were above freezing. For those of you who don't want to do the math, that's 84 days of temps below 32. And just so you don't jump to the conclusion that it was in the upper 20's most of the time, the average HIGH temperature for the season was 4.5 degrees.
Yes. That's was the average high: 4.5° fahrenheit. That's the coldest high ever -- well since they started keeping records, at least. There's no celebrating that winter's over, either. See the high today was 9°. And it's already dropping fast and it's going to be well below zero tonight, tomorrow, Wednesday, Friday, Saturday and Sunday night. And since the forecast calls for a low of -10 on Saturday night, where we are we could be looking at a good -15 to -20. Because that's how we roll.
We have three feet of snow everywhere. That's not the banks. That's just ground cover snow. Three feet. The snow that fell in November is still on the ground. And the snow that is falling right now? That's just going to pile up on top. According to some, we're supposed to get another 30" (that's 2.5 feet, you know) in the month of March. Joy.
The frost line, in some places, is 8 feet deep and pushing down. That's why everything is freezing up around us. Most northern cities are still pushing the "run your water to keep the pipes from freezing up" idea. Although the very cold weather and the excessive water use is starting to stress out the water treatment plants. And there's still lots of news on how the entire Great Lakes system is trying very hard to turn into a giant ice cube. It goes without saying that all the lakes around here have ice 3 or 4 feet deep.
I'm trying hard not to think about the wildlife kill off this winter is going to bring. It's going to be brutal. We'll be lucky to make it through the winter with anything. And of course, it's going to take forever to warm up. Even if this stunning cold weather lets up and allows us to be close to normal temps, we have all that snow, frost and ice that will keep the temperatures low just by virtue of existing. I can guarantee you that a 40 degree breeze won't be anywhere near 40 after it covers a mile or two of ice and snow.
As much as I would like to put that hypothesis to the test, our forecast doesn't even have temps in the 30's listed.
So, while it won't bother me if you complain about how "terrible" your weather is, or how much you miss spring or you long for warmer weather, unless your winter can compare to what we've been living though, you ain't gettin' no sympathy.