Ticker for December 3, 2024

                
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December 3, 2024   December 3, 2024   December 3, 2024   December 3, 2024


Bzzzttt




I was putting up my Christmas lights Saturday afternoon right when the sun started
going low in the sky, and I crawled up my 20-foot ladder to put a light on the
crest of the dormer (hey, "Crest of the Dormer" was my band's first hit song back
in the reformatory school!), and I get all the way to the top of the ladder to
find A WASP WAITING FOR ME!

Now remember the scene in "Every Which Way But Loose" (of course you don't because
you don't know fine films like me) when Herb the cop was trying to spy on Philo
to ambush him with his other cop buddy because Philo beat them up in a bar, and
he peeked over a tree only to find a rattlesnake staring back at him, and he says,
"Feet don't fail me now"?



Just letting you know that you'll need to watch that one if you want to see the
sequel, "Any Which Way You Can." Right turn, Clyde.

That's how I reacted when I came face to....errrrrr, frons (look it up!) with
that wasp. As I hurriedly scampered down the ladder to get the wasp spray, I
thought "there has to be a better way!"

This morning is that better way. There's very little usefulness in cold weather.
Maybe a day or two to have snow right around Christmas (keep dreaming), maybe
three or four days to get through a pot of chili. But other than that, about the
only good thing about cold weather like this morning is killing bugs. And this
morning should at LEAST keep the little jerks hiding at least.

The statewide average low temperature this morning was 23.5 degrees, making this
the coldest morning we've seen in the state since February 18ths 18.6 degrees,
and barely beating out November 29ths 24.1 degrees. Today's mark doesn't show up
on this graph yet, but you can see back 10 months ago when it was last this cold.



Heck, it's freezing right now for crying out loud! Sorry, it hasn't rained in so
long I had to repurpose my "for crying out louds."



The wind chills are no picnic either.



Now we'll start to warm up again before another front oozes through on Thursday,
then warm up again before another front early next week, and so on and so
forth. However, if you want a bit of excitement, then the western Panhandle is
for you (bet you've never heard that before!).



Hey, when you were getting 11 inches of rain, they were getting 26 inches of
snow!



As this forecast model shows for snowfall through next Wednesday...things are
getting a bit more interesting.



Then there's the always-crazy American forecast model.



Ahhh, I love you GFS forecast model...you're like that Uncle that convinces you
that you can shoot pop-bottle rockets off holding them in your hand.

Seems really exciting at first, then...not so much.

Gary McManus
State Climatologist
Oklahoma Mesonet
Oklahoma Climate Survey
gmcmanus@ou.edu