[Sca-cooks] OT: Weather in Oertha

[Sharron Albert]

>Four hundred miles.  Where you at, Fairbanks?

Yep. Since 1964 it's been my home town.

>That "hint of rain;" I've had to teardown and clear a site in 30 
>minutes, because the flood crest was five feet above normal and the 
>site would be cut off for the next three days.  And I've been in a 
>camp while lightning strikes blasted in around us on one of those 
>"dry" weekends.  Weather is always local and it's a judgement call.

I was aiming that primarily at some of the Westies who seem 
particularly prone to this. Also, it was a few years ago, before the 
more common odd weather patterns on this planet. I was just pokin' 
some fun. We had a coronet in the north-of-Anchorage area a few years 
ago where it rained so hard Friday night, they had to cut trenches 
down the road (people were camped on either side; constab was at the 
bottom) to carry the water past constab. It cleared Saturday morning 
just long enough for the tourney, promptly clouded over and was wet 
the rest of the weekend (altho not another drench like Friday night). 
This was the time of Obadiah's "Rain." Apparently it was wet during 
his entire reign, wherever he was (G).

What we don't have are great muckin' thunderstorms with lightning 
(well, hardly never) and tornadoes. We do have floods, earthquakes, 
landslides, black ice on roads, snowed-in passes. And, of course, 
volcanoes, if you're flying to come visiting (G).

>I'll point out that 50 miles can be worse than running Highway 3, if 
>it's through Dallas or Chicago at rush hour.  Because of the 
>population density and the distances involved, I'll bet large events 
>in Oertha are few and far between and carefully planned and 
>scheduled to get the most attendence. That's the way it used to be 
>in the early days of Ansteorra with two or three major events per 
>month and time to recuperate in between.  Now we have two to four 
>events per weekend and the travel can be a real drag.  Sometimes 50 
>miles IS just too much.

We have two coronet tourneys at year. They used to be held on a 
rotating basis between the Anchorage area, Fairbanks and Juneau. Now 
they are bid on. Two summers ago it was in Kenai, which was an 
additional 150 to go for us Fairbanksans. It's a toss-up: many hours 
on the road; lots of nasty traffic. On the other hand, the Kenai 
Peninsula is no fun on Friday night and Sunday afternoon during the 
summer. All the camping/vacationing land whales are heading for Homer 
or home.

All the rest of the events are "local" with some getting more 
visitors than others. We seldom have conflicting events. Three major 
groups, four weekends a month. But there was a time I was running 
down to Eskalya/Anchorage a couple times a month to events.

Morgana, noting the high tomorrow is supposed to be -30F (brrrr), 
with lows tomorrow night maybe hitting -45F. No end in sight until at 
least the weekend, if then.
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Morgana yr Oerfa, OP
Winter's Gate/Oertha/West
Per saltire gules and sable, in pale two mullets and
in fess an increscent	 and a decrescent argent.