Yes, we have been pretty miserable this week, what with rolling blackouts, sub-freezing temperatures, and skating rink roads. So, as a public service, and to cheer everyone up, know that it has been a lot worse in Dallas.
If the forecast holds and we don’t break freezing until Saturday morning, we will have had about 120 consecutive hours of sub-freezing weather. Which is nowhere near a record. That honor goes to the winter of 1983, when the temperature stayed below 32 for 295 hours — from 7 a.m. Dec 18 to 2 p.m. Dec. 30. So, children, when your parents tell you that they walked uphill to school in the snow both ways that winter, they probably did.
In fact, our suffering won’t even put us in the top six of sub-freezing endurance sessions. No. 6 came in 1996, when we went through 136 consecutive hours below 32 from Jan. 30 to Feb. 5.
