What’s your favorite Christmas (Holiday) gift? Mine is a toss-up between the Atari 2600 and a Christmas Eve/Christmas Day snowstorm in 1978. Growing up in the Berkshires, my winters were usually snowy (it’s what helped to light the fuse for my crush on meteorology) but not always around December 24-25th. Historically speaking, western New England does far much better than coastal New England due to the proximity to the “warm” ocean in December:
It’s pretty close to a slam dunk for the Berkshires to experience a white Christmas, which the National Weather Service defines as At least 1″ of snow on the ground on December 25th, but for Boston, serious help is required (ie…a cold pattern right before Christmas). As of this morning, here is what snow depth looks like across New England:
Keep dreamin’ Bostonians and if you want snow–drive north and or west for a couple of hours. We actually have a storm heading this way tomorrow but the air in southern New England is just a little too warm for snow so plan on only raindrops (from about 10am-2pm). Farther inland (where snow is on the ground) there is likely to be a couple of hours (8-10am) of some light & patchy mixed precipitation tomorrow morning. Perhaps enough to lay down a coating on top of what there is out west. It’s a weak weather system, so the whole thing is done by late tomorrow afternoon and skies clear tomorrow evening–no issues for Christmas Eve services or parties. Sunshine makes a return for Christmas Sunday along with seasonable temps–generally 35-40. A far cry from the past couple of years when it was nothing but Mr. Heat Miser weather:
Looking into next week, much the same…seasonable temps with no big snowstorms in sight. Have a safe & Merry Christmas. Tomorrow is the first day of Hanukkah–Happy Hanukkah to my Jewish brothers & sisters.
~JR