A: They don’t.
It’s a fact. We just don’t know how to cope.
Tonight we’re expecting some sleet and/or freezing rain, and everyone is freaking out. The school system already has plans for like, four different scenarios. I’m pretty sure everyone up north is laughing at us as we scramble around the grocery store, emptying the shelves of milk, eggs and bread.. I guess it’s so we can at least make french toast while we’re trapped in our houses.
Seriously though, things could get pretty bad. It’s always when we’re not expecting much that we get piles of ice (never snow, we wouldn’t be that lucky). I’m holding my fingers for a delay tomorrow, but nothing major.
Oh my gosh! I didn’t know you were a ‘fellow Southerner’? Small-ish world isn’t it? I agree with your take on Southerners and winter weather – out in the countryside where my husband and I live we don’t freak out too much, being around farmers and whatnot we have to take it in and deal with it. On the other hand when we head into the big city of Nashville the folks there are insane. They can’t drive, stores close and hardly anyone goes out. Snow is the worst to deal with in the city – it was the first time I’d ever seen stores, shopping centers, entire malls close up because there was about an inch of snow on the ground.
I’m not originally from the South, my husband is, I moved here years ago from the Sierra Nevada mountains (CA/NV) and the week we moved here it had snowed 8 feet up there in Lake Tahoe. Nothing stops or closes for that, so needless to say I about fell over laughing at the sight of closed stores for an inch.
Since being here for awhile now though, I can see why people freak out – it’s so infrequent that when it happens most folks are caught off guard and basically panic. I’ve also learned to shop a bit extra for things in case the power goes out, or roads get closed and the like.
Right now we’re having sleet fall on us – it’s been hours and hours now. We never seem to get snow either; just sleet and ice. I prepare to deal with no power should this continue because trees will snap and limbs will take out power lines. -sigh-
As for those stuffy Northerners – hehehe – well, trust me, they go through the same thing too. : )