My credulous sons think that if you put a spoon under your pillow the night before, or wear your pajamas inside-out, you’ll have no school the next day. I’d never heard of this before. Had you? Are there any other such kids’ superstitions in your neck of the woods?
I used to do a snow dance (like a rain dance). I think it only worked once, but we got three days off because of it.
Wear plastic bags (usually, the ones that newspapers will come in) over your socks and in your shoes the prior day. It means you’re expecting deep, wet, awe-inspiring snow. Or so kids thought where I grew up.
Other than that, the only other thing I ever remember kids doing is praying ala Bart Simpson.
Our whole kindergarten class used to do a snow dance and song, and it always worked. (I have my suspicions now that the teacher was privy to the forecast for the next day.)
Christmas Eve and incoming snow were the only times I think I ever believed in God. And prayed like hell to Him for it. (That’s right, I said Him - I’m supposed to be a Catholic).
Since then, the Big Guy and I have tried to establish a mutual assured destruction treaty. Negotiations are ongoing. Dammit - the dealer always wins. I don’t think he’s negotiating in good faith; perhaps I can find an arbitrator.
I recently heard that flushing ice cubes down the toilet is one of the superstitions.
I heard that one more than 50 years ago.
I had a brief look in some folklore references: there are a lot of references to children’s rhymes to encourage snow, in multiple languages, but I found less on superstitions. There’s a more general superstition about wearing clothes inside-out, which is generally considered to bad luck or to invite trouble, but it could as easily be independent invention. Inversion of the ordinary.
Even through high school, if we got a bit of snow but not enough for a delayed start or a day off, we would inquire as to which traitorous classmate neglected to turn their pajamas inside out before bed.
Bah, that’s all amateur snow-day superstition. When I was in high school, the teachers taught us about St. Scholastica, the patron saint of snow days. No, really.
I don’t remember what caused snow days, but when it did start snowing kids would yell “Hooray for Head & Shoulders!” (Snow, apparently, was dandruff from the angels in Heaven.)
I miss snow days. Even when I was completely snowed in last year for a week (a Corvette cannot negotiate a 3-foot berm of plowed snow very well) I still had to work remotely. I want a snow day!
And of course if it doesn’t work, you get to stay home due to fulminant athlete’s foot.
My kids did the inside out pajamas one. FTR, it doesn’t really work in Florida.
Living in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan did it for me. Plenty o’ snow days every year.
The closest thing I’ve heard about was that either El Nino or La Nina would mean no snow days. That, and we always joked about spraying down the superintendent’s porch so he would think it too icy to go out. (And I just now got the much worse implications :eek:)
My wife just found these articles: