A strong Alberta clip­per will track south­east over south­ern Ontario today into upstate New York tonight. Snow heavy at times has spread right across the Ottawa Valley into Québec and will con­tin­ue through­out the day.

Snowfall rates have often been 2 to 4 cm per hour with this very strong clip­per.

Freezing rain and ice pel­lets have moved into the St Lawrence Valley area east of Brockville late this after­noon. A sharp Arctic cold front will blast through the regions this evening as the clip­per sails into north­ern New York state. Temperatures will plunge up to 10 degrees to well below freez­ing with­in the first hour after the front goes through. As a result: rain in the regions east of Lake Huron and south­east of Georgian Bay will change sud­den­ly over to snow or flur­ries with untreat­ed sur­faces quick­ly becom­ing icy and very slip­pery.

Elsewhere the snow and freez­ing rain will pull out of the regions this evening as the clip­per and sharp Arctic cold front moves into north­ern New England and south­ern Québec. Snowfall amounts of 15 to 20 cm are like­ly in the snowsqualls along with white­out con­di­tions from blow­ing snow.

Dangerous trav­el­ling con­di­tions are expect­ed due to very low to at times nil vis­i­bil­i­ty in heavy snow blow­ing snow and icy con­di­tions. All trav­ellers should exer­cise extreme cau­tion and adjust plans accord­ing­ly.

My most vivid mem­o­ries of the spring are from high school. About a month before exams began, every guy would start spend­ing a min­i­mum of thir­ty min­utes look­ing out the win­dow every day. On the south­ern side of the main build­ing would be a small foot­ball field, and two soc­cer fields, as well as the ten­nis courts, hock­ey rink, and large swim­ming pool. Three more fields used for var­i­ous oth­er sports, such as lacrosse, crick­et, and field hock­ey, could be seen on the west­ern side. At the north was the base­ball dia­mond, as well as the small pool, and more ten­nis courts. The main gates of the school prop­er­ty, what many con­sid­ered a tri­umphant walk away from the main build­ing after a day with no spares, was at the east.

What male teenag­er would be think­ing about any­thing but run­ning through the wood­en halls, throw­ing off their tie, and rolling in the lus­cious­ly green, well-man­i­cured grass? In a school with a lack of females, no less. Add to the fact that a sig­nif­i­cant por­tion of alum­ni pride is put into a well-fund­ed sports pro­gramme, and the result was class­es of boys bot­tling testos­terone, encour­aged by teacher and coach alike to be released in the form of phys­i­cal activ­i­ty. (I find sports metephors very use­ful for mak­ing veiled sex­u­al ref­er­ences.)

I could see it in every one of them, how dif­fi­cult it would become to con­cen­trate in class, instead of imag­in­ing how the hours after school were to be spent. But it was nev­er like that for me. While every­one else was wait­ing for the fields to thaw, I’d be wait­ing for the snow the fall. It’s days like these that make it hard for me to con­cen­trate.

All I want to do is stay at home wrapped in a blan­ket, watch the snow col­lect, and write.