Now, I know you’re a hometown boy, so I won’t go too hard on you, but you really need to step up your game a little bit. Over the past 20 years, you’ve predicted 6 more weeks of winter 16 times! And you went 31 consecutive years starting in 1903 without telling us of an early spring. I have no idea how your PR people helped you through that. It’s like you take special joy in depressing us every winter.
OK, sure, it’s PA. We only have four seasons here- almost winter, winter, still winter, and road construction. And I know you have a reputation for accuracy that you must maintain. But can’t you find it in yourself to give me a glimmer of hope every now and then? Next year, I want you to do the right thing. Bring the sun out a little earlier than usual. Or, I’m afraid, your time with us will be cut short.
The thing I have never understood. When the hell has Winter ever ended on February 2 anywhere in America?That’s pretty much the heart of winter. The coldest statistical average temperature is around Jan 20th. Winter simply doesn’t ever end less than two weeks after that. 6 weeks is around March 17. I don’t even recall Winter ever ending that early. Maybe if you brought the ol rat out on March 24th or so and looked at it’s shadow it might make some sense.
Ever been to Punxsutawney? If you have, you’ll know why Phil is so constantly pessimistic…“Punxy” is just about one of the dullest towns in west-central PA–and that’s saying a lot, considering that west-central PA is not exactly a hotbed of excitement in the first place. Once all the mills and factories which were the town’s biggest employers shut down, people left in droves. There’s not much there except the old folks who can’t afford to leave. The story of west-central PA, in other words, but with the added bonus of a weather-predicting rodent.
A college friend of mine grew up there, and he reported that there is nothing, absolutely nothing going for the town other than Groundhog Day. So much so, in fact, that according to him the film Groundhog Day was originally supposed to be shot in Punxy, but advance production scouts quickly scotched that idea after visiting the place. They didn’t want Bill Murray, Andie McDowell, and the rest of the cast and crew to die of boredom there.
I suppose the real question is, “Why doesn’t Phil call for six more weeks of winter, and six more decades of crippling economic depression?”
Hear hear. Where I live, 6 more weeks of winter would make it a short winter. 6 weeks? I’d welcome only 6 more weeks. Not bloody likely here in Minnesota.
Am I the only person who ever heard that Phil’s predictions were either “six more weeks of winter” or “an early spring in six weeks”? Or did my parents spin it, even way back when?
You aren’t from the South, are ya? If you draw a line from Atlanta, through Birmingham, Jackson, and over to Houston, you’ll see that there generally isn’t a whole lot of winter weather below that line. Even as far north as Memphis, there usually isn’t much winter, relatively speaking. In the town where I was raised, snow is a once-or-twice a decade event. Folks still talk about the blizzard of 1972, where we got maybe 2-3 inches of snow and it lasted almost two whole days.
But deciding whether winter in the North may or may not end on February 2 is about as useful as deciding whether summer in the South may or may not end on July 2.
I’ve started rooting for Phil to predict 6 more weeks of winter. If you can guarantee that winter always ends by the middle of March, I’ll get you elected to King of Minnesota (or at least VulcanusRex)
That’s a corollary. You don’t get to declare winter over, when winter never happens, and if there is not an end to winter, ipso facto winter cannot end on February 2nd.
I’ve always wondered that, too. I’ve never heard of it being spring on February 2nd. I always thought “Six more weeks of winter” was fairly optimistic because hey, it’ll be warm by mid-March. And March is always an iffy month weather wise.
