Friends,
This storm thing has been pummeling Southern California for a few days now and it’s been a joy. By joy, of course, I mean that we’ve seen everything you want to see in a winter storm. You want your hail? Squalls? Snow? Rock porridge? We’ve got it all.
We’ll even have something that I’ve never heard before. I’ll let the National Weather Service breathlessly blort it out in all-caps…
POST FRONTAL INSTABILITY WILL RESULT IN WIDELY SCATTERED SHOWERS TONIGHT…WITH SNOW ABOVE 5500 FEET. SOME RAIN AND SNOW SHOWERS COULD BE HEAVY. PERIODS OF SNOW OR GRAUPEL ARE ALSO POSSIBLE DOWN TO 5000 FEET OR LOWER DURING HEAVY SHOWERS.
Graupel? What is this thing? Jewish wontons? No, dear reader, it’s simultaneously more bizarre and more common. It’s the balls of snow that seem like styrofoam rolling off your windshield. Weird? Not so much, but I’d never heard the term before. It’s almost like we English speakers have hundreds of words for snow or something.
Chilly, but fun,
– bob
I'm still grapule-ing with the term "post-frontal instability." I guess it's better than full frontal noodlety, though.
Is that a pic of Stephane Grappelli?
Why yes, Mrs. Anonymous. Mr. Grappelli is on the left.