Who Still Has Christmas Lights Up?

I do a lot of driving around, and it spawns many of my stories here. That is the case today, as we ponder when exactly it becomes strange that you still have the Christmas lights up.

I got these pictures in a 3 sq mile area of Plymouth and Bourne. I'm sure that this article could have 50 pictures if I felt like wasting a night plowing through Suburbia with my camera. I took every single picture after Martin Luther King Day.

Before we even discuss this, I want it on the record that I'm not making fun of these people. To the contrary, I admire them. They are holiday honey badgers... they go where they want to, and they don't give a uffffffff. When you and I have let go of Christmas 2016, they are still plugging in the lights for another night of 2017 holiday cheer.

We took a peek at who had the Christmas lights up early, and "prior to Veterans Day" seems to be the Mendoza Line for "when roaming journalists with nothing to write about might take notice of your property." Likewise, the holiday for Dr. King- a man of peace, who somehow still paid a soldier's debt- is a pretty good cutoff point for "that same journalist is now outside your house, aiming a camera."

Sorry about the blurry pics. I keep odd hours, much like a werewolf, and I'm a large and menacing person to see stopping his car in your yard and getting out. I'm actually a fun and goofy guy, but you won't know that when you see me doing my thing in your yard out of nowhere at 5 AM. Anyhow, I just snap-shotted this picture, hence the Blurry.

Even if you like a nice Veterans Day to Jesus Day to MLK Day light show, MLK Day was Monday. I'm publishing this on Wednesday. Leaving the lights up until Groundhog Day (and we're closer to that than we are to Christmas) makes it more likely that he sees his shadow, and having them up on Valentine's Day makes it more likely that you'll be sleeping on the couch.

Part of it is the holiday weekend. With an extra day off, you really should have created some time to get out there and yank the lights down. Your next holiday is President's Day, and that is some time away, player.

In case you're wondering, the Twelve Days Of Christmas are generally thought to begin with Christmas and end on January 5th. January 5th is also known as Tomorrow Minus Two Weeks. If you put the lights up during Veterans Day weekend and leave them up until a week from Friday, you'll have done the Twelve Weeks Of Christmas. I do have some votes for the Epiphany, which is January 8th.

Many people on Cape Cod and other coastal regions use string lights on their decks and porches all year, but this tends to be more secular and less holiday-driven. There are those who say that those lights are there to help beach-walkers find their way home, especially if they have been drinking.

Another secular thing claimed by Cape Cod are the Christmas-looking red and green exterior lights.... which are actually some sort of nautical thing telling you which way you're supposed to drive around a channel buoy or something.

One of my pictures comes from a construction company near the Cedarville Marylou's. The house picture is from Plymouth Road, in Bourne. I'll be watching each property, as they are on the coffee run route from my house. One of them is going to cave in first and take their Christmas lights down.

Nothing other than just who that will be interests me right now.

January 2017 Blizzard Pics, Snowfall Totals

Our model Joeyna helps you get the drift of things with this here Blizzard of 2017

Snowfall total in Bourne, near the Bourne Bridge... 17"

The silent white dawn after a heavy snowfall... very Robert Frost, except that Robert Frost probably wasn't hanging around a Quality Inn.

We worked the camera around Bourne and Plymouth. They, and the interior Plymouth County towns like Bridgewater, Wareham and Halifax, were the epicenter of the storm... at least as far as snowfall went.

I was all in on some snowy country lane shots. This is Cedarville.

Of course I went to Marylou's. I'd have shoveled it out myself if I had to...

Let's check some snowfall totals, shall we?

East Bridgewater 19.5″
West Wareham 18.1"
Whitman 18.0″
Middleboro 17.6″
Norwell 17.1″
Hanover 17.0″
North Plymouth 17.0″
Rockland 17.0″
Buzzards Bay 17"
Acushnet 16.5″

Carver 16.5″
South Weymouth 16.5″
Brockton 16.4″
Dartmouth 16.0″
Kingston 16.0″
New Bedford 16.0″
East Freetown 15.5″
Hanson 15.5″
Oak Bluffs 15.5″
Marion 15.0″
Rochester 15.0″

East Harwich 14.5″
Fairhaven 14.5″
Mashpee Neck 14.5″
Plymouth 14.0″
South Plymouth 14.0″
Bourne (Capeside) 13.8″
Sandwich 13.5″
North Weymouth 13.5″
Taunton 13.3″

West Plymouth 13.3″
Freetown 13.2″
Bridgewater 13.0″
Harwich 13.0″
Holbrook 13.0″
Marstons Mills 13.0″
Pembroke 13.0″
Scituate 13.0″
West Harwich 13.0″
Westport 13.0″

Mansfield 12.5″
South Yarmouth 11.5″
Teaticket 11.5″
Assonet 11.0″
Yarmouthport 10.5″
Canton 10.0″
Franklin 10.0″
Brewster 9.5″

Walpole 9.2″
Attleboro 9.0″
Hull 9.0″
Wellfleet 9.0″
Foxboro 8.6″
Braintree 8.5″
Falmouth 8.5″
Framingham 8.4″
Beverly 8.3″
Dighton 8.0″
Dover 8.0″

Marblehead 8.0″
Natick 8.0″
Pocasset 8.0″
Wrentham 8.0″
Milford 7.8″
Mashpee 7.5″
Roslindale 7.5″
Somerset 7.2″
Everett 7.0″

Marblehead 8.0″
Natick 8.0″
Pocasset 8.0″
Wrentham 8.0″
Milford 7.8″
Mashpee 7.5″
Roslindale 7.5″
Somerset 7.2″
Everett 7.0″
Lynn 7.0″
Mendon 7.0″
Needham Heights 7.0″
Norwood 7.0″
South Chatham 7.0″

Danvers 6.8″
Topsfield 6.5″
Northbridge 6.5″
Malden 6.2″
Wakefield 6.2″
Gloucester 6.0″
Ipswich 6.0″
Peabody 6.0″
Nantucket 6.0″
Stoneham 6.0″
Saugus 6.0″

Hamilton 5.8″
Webster 5.8″
Arlington 5.5″
Littleton 5.5″
Reading 5.5″
Sudbury 5.5″
Waltham 5.5″
Northboro 5.2″
Leominster 5.1″

Sturbridge 5.0″
Lexington 4.9″
Wayland 4.5″
Boylston 4.1″
Billerica 4.0″
Burlington 4.0″
East Brewster 4.0″
Haverhill 4.0″
Hopkinton 4.0″
North Chelmsford 4.0″

Dracut 3.8″
Carlisle 3.7″
Blandford 3.5″
Westford 3.5″
Melrose 3.3″
East Boxford 3.0″
East Longmeadow 3.0″
Hubbardston 3.0″

Quincy 3.0″
Ware 3.0″
Ludlow 2.8″
Southwick 2.8″
Wilbraham 2.5″
Chicopee 2.0″

We like to get a picture of the more snowed-in cars. Mine would have won, but the pic was blurry.

Makes sense, at least today...

Dawn at the Bourne Bridge...

I tried a few mid-blizzard shots, but this was the least blurry one.

"No Lifeguard On Duty"

Yup, I shoot when I'm drivin'... I do have the courtesy to stop the car in the middle of the road first.

We even mess around with some video, below...

Blizzard Warning For South Shore, Cape Cod And The Islands

We apologize for being all over your Facebook feed, but we did promise to be back with an update if things changed... and, by God, change hath come. Someone at the NWS dropped the B Word.

The National Weather Service has issued a Blizzard Warning for Cape Cod, East Coastal Plymouth County (roughly anyone with a shoreline from Quincy to Plymouth) and both Martha's Vineyard and Nantucket.

The South Coast, which will not get the ocean-effect/enhanced snow from the NE winds, only gets a Winter Storm Warning.

This storm isn't messing around. It also seems to gain 4 inches in the forecasts every time I take a pause from my Journalism to get high, stalk ex-girlfriends and/or peruse internet pornography. I could use a large Funky Fanabla from Marylou's right now, seeing as I'm at the tail end of a Werewolf Shift, but I'm afraid that we'll be due for 3 feet of snow by the time I get back... if I get back.

We're looking at 18-24" in a stretch running from Chatham west to Onset, then north (about 10-15 miles in from the coast) up to Duxbury Beach. You get 12-18" from Duxbury to Boston, and running south (and to the west of the coast) down to the Rhode Island border. The whole South Coast is in the 12-18" window, as is the entire interior of Plymouth County.

This is also falling on a good 5" or so left over from yesterday's entertainment with Storm #1 for much of SE Massachusetts.

This is a dangerous storm. Thank the gods that it isn't hitting during a weekday commute. Wish that this was happening when the Patriots host some sunny-weather team like Miami or Houston in the AFC playoffs. While we wouldn't anticipate you being snowbound for a week, it may not hurt to buy necessary things like beer and tobacco in bulk.

We aren't anticipating a driving ban, but you never know. Only fools and emergency personnel will be on the roads Saturday. You could get a thousand kinds of messed up if you had a car accident in this weather, and only about half of those will be injuries sustained in the accident.

Frozen in place like Jack Torrance? Could happen. Hit by a plow, left in the street, then hit by another plow? Signs say Possible. You think you're walking down Shore Road somewhere, but you instead are walking off a pier into the stormy Atlantic, where a late-staying Great White Shark devours you? OK, that's not too likely, but if it was going to happen, today would be a prime candidate.

You want to read this article quickly, because blizzards have a funny way of knocking out power to the area. It will take Eversource a long time to get you back on if that happens. Today is a day to settle whatever grudges you may have with the neighbor who has the fireplace and the huge wood pile.

We're pretty much done with forecasting, and our next articles will involve me heading out (on foot, I don't trust my beater car in this weather) to get pictures. We'll publish them as long as we are able to. Feel free to hit up our Facebook Page with any pictures that you wouldn't mind seeing up on these pages.

Hunker down and stay safe, folks. As Fred G. Sanford once said, "This is the big one, Elizabeth."

UPDATE: Heavy Snow To Hit SE Massachusetts Saturday

4 PM Update

Shawna Costa, on the cam...

Uhm, yeah, about that "not too bad" snowfall forecast for Saturday that we issued yesterday.

Ooops.

As it turns out, Saturday's storm may have a bit of the hot sauce on it, if you know what I mean. The National Weather Service has a Winter Storm Watch up for Saturday.

Snowfall totals, previously thought to be in the 2-4" range, are now in the 9-12" range. The 9-12" is actually a scaled down version of the 8-15" that the National Weather Service dropped in their morning forecast.

The fun should start around noon tomorrow, and it should snow through midnight, easily. There could be some ocean enhancement along the coast, and some ocean effect flurries could hang around on Sunday morn.

In all, the Canal area of Cape Cod could have a stretch where someone gets 20" of snow this weekend. Bourne, for instance, picked up 5" today, and are forecast to be in the epicenter of tomorrow's entertainment.

I haven't heard an actual weatherman (or Cindy or Shiri) say that coastal flooding is a concern. However, the winds should be whipping up from the NE at a 15-20 mph clip right around when the afternoon high tide hits. The Irish Riviera, the Cape and the Islands could get NE wind gusts up to 40 mph, so keep an eye on the sea, coasties!

We'll pop back in for an update tomorrow if the forecast then is as radically different from today's as today's was from yesterday.

BARNSTABLE:

...WINTER STORM WATCH FROM SATURDAY MORNING THROUGH SUNDAY
MORNING...

* LOCATIONS...INCLUDE COASTAL PLYMOUTH COUNTY...CAPE COD AND THE
ISLANDS.

* ACCUMULATIONS...SNOW ACCUMULATION OF 6 TO 12 INCHES POSSIBLE
SATURDAY AFTERNOON AND EVENING.

* TIMING...SNOW OVERSPREADS THE AREA SATURDAY MORNING AND LIKELY
BECOMING HEAVY AT TIMES SATURDAY AFTERNOON AND EVENING...THEN
TAPERING OFF LATE SATURDAY NIGHT.

* IMPACTS...UNTREATED ROADS WILL BECOME SNOW COVERED AND SLICK.
VISIBILITY WILL BE REDUCED. TRAVEL WILL BECOME HAZARDOUS AS
SNOW BECOMES HEAVY AT TIMES ALONG WITH GUSTY NORTHEAST WINDS
RESULTING IN CONSIDERABLE BLOWING AND DRIFTING WITH NEAR WHITE
OUT CONDITIONS POSSIBLE.

PRECAUTIONARY/PREPAREDNESS ACTIONS...

A WINTER STORM WATCH MEANS THERE IS A POTENTIAL FOR SIGNIFICANT
SNOW...SLEET...OR ICE ACCUMULATIONS THAT MAY IMPACT TRAVEL.
CONTINUE TO MONITOR THE LATEST FORECASTS. BE PREPARED TO MODIFY
TRAVEL PLANS SHOULD WINTER WEATHER DEVELOP.

Buttermilk Bay

SOUTHERN PLYMOUTH:

...WINTER STORM WATCH FROM SATURDAY MORNING THROUGH LATE SATURDAY
NIGHT...

* LOCATIONS...INCLUDE EASTERN AND INTERIOR SOUTHEASTERN
MASSACHUSETTS...NORTHEASTERN CONNECTICUT...AND ALL OF RHODE
ISLAND.

* ACCUMULATIONS...SNOW ACCUMULATION OF 4 TO 8 INCHES POSSIBLE
SATURDAY AFTERNOON AND EVENING.

* TIMING...SNOW OVERSPREADS THE AREA SATURDAY MORNING AND LIKELY
BECOMING HEAVY AT TIMES SATURDAY AFTERNOON AND EVENING...THEN
TAPERING OFF LATE SATURDAY NIGHT.

* IMPACTS...UNTREATED ROADS WILL BECOME SNOW COVERED AND SLICK.
VISIBILITY WILL BE REDUCED. TRAVEL WILL BECOME HAZARDOUS AS
SNOW BECOMES HEAVY AT TIMES ALONG WITH GUSTY NORTHEAST WINDS
RESULTING IN CONSIDERABLE BLOWING AND DRIFTING WITH NEAR WHITE
OUT CONDITIONS POSSIBLE.

PRECAUTIONARY/PREPAREDNESS ACTIONS...

A WINTER STORM WATCH MEANS THERE IS A POTENTIAL FOR SIGNIFICANT
SNOW...SLEET...OR ICE ACCUMULATIONS THAT MAY IMPACT TRAVEL.
CONTINUE TO MONITOR THE LATEST FORECASTS. BE PREPARED TO MODIFY
TRAVEL PLANS SHOULD WINTER WEATHER DEVELOP.

Southeastern Massachusetts Nature Blitz

S'up?

We encounter a lot of nature in our travels, and that's no bull. Well, technically, that IS a bull, but you know what I mean...

All of the livestock in this article came from some farm on Old Sandwich Road in Plymouth.

"Go; behold, I send you out as lambs in the midst of wolves."

That is either a buffalo, a bison or a shaggy cow... Old McDonald, I am not.

If you catch the cow as it walks in front of the bull, the cow looks like it has a big curved Unicorn horn on her snout.

Alpacas are pretty friendly, as it turns out. I swear that the alpaca in the top shot of this article was way across the field from me, beyond the range of my shoddy phone. I simply had to go "Hey, you, a little closer, please," and he came running over just like this and posed for the top shot.

"You don't work here, and I'm going to greatly resent it if you grab my udders."

Hey! Back in the turkey article with you!

There are several foxes in my neighborhood, to the point where I have named them. This is Samantha Fox, her sisters and brothers are named Alicia, Vivica, Meghan, 20th Century and Redd. Redd is the patriarch, his wife Elizabeth has passed on.

Every coyote in my neighborhood, regardless of gender, is named "Wild E."

Merry Christmas From Cranberry County Magazine

We're just stopping in to wish you and your family the happiest of holiday seasons.

Doing a lonely 12 hour shift Christmas at the hotel, but I have my tree for company. 

No, I don't know why we have both a star and an angel. My guess is that we had not one but two tree topping ornaments, we let them fight it out, and the angel won. The angel's victory may have involved Divine Might, but it also my have been influenced by how much cord we had for the star.

I seem to recall the angel standing alone, perhaps on my desk, last year. It just goes to show you that, even if you ride the bench or sing in the chorus, circumstances might put you up on top of the tree someday. I'd say that it's sort of like A Star Is Born, but that might offend the actual star in the photo. It's also sort of like Rudolph's story, but Rudolph doesn't fare too well in today's column (see below), so we'll just move on to the next tangent.

The housekeepers (from India) sense that I may be a bit sad about spending Christmas alone in an empty hotel like Jack Torrance, so they have been trying to cheer me up without speaking English by showing me pictures of the mango farm they own back home. 

 While we don't like to throw our weight around, we do feel an obligation to let you know that Santa saw fit to give drone strike capacity to Cranberry County Magazine. It's, like, in the back of the bag.

Belmont Circle rotary, Buzzards Bay.... Bourne likes blue nights at night, I like blue lights at night, but my camera has no love at all for blue lights at night.

Somebody in Marsh Vegas is getting coal in their stocking this year.

When you hang Rudolph in effigy, especially when you do so after slitting Rudolph's throat so that the blood doesn't spoil the meat, it moves you right up the Naughty List in Spring-Heel Jack style leapfrog bounds.. This dude is getting nothing for Christmas this year, but that matters little to a well-motivated man with a rifle and 250 pounds of fresh, infmaous venison. 

Is he vomiting up Hot Tamales? That's kind of cool, actually.

Still, ain't no one tryin' to see that on Christmas...

OK, almost no one... 

Bumbles went out like a sucker in his only TV appearance, and isn't above holding a grudge. There may be blood on those paws for all we know, and a stench that all of the perfumes of Arabia couldn't, uhm, de-stench. 

This is a personal grudge of mine, and I may be on an island here.... but does anyone merit his own spinoff Christmas special more than Bumbles does? The friggin' Little Drummer Boy has a special, as does Dominick the Italian Christmas Donkey. Bumbles is suffering mad holiday disrespeck!

I could write a Bumbles holiday special in 45 minutes if there was a check waiting and I had access to high-grade marijuana. I'd have him rampaging through the Yukon, swallowing Eskimo children whole, before getting the Christmas spirit and switching teams at the coda. It'd be like A Christmas Carol , but with major plot elements lifted from both War Of The Gargantuas and 30 Days Of Night.