There is a snowstorm heading to Indiana in the next few days. It has been the number one headline for the past couple of days (except for maybe the Colts ticket situation, which is now resolved) as the news stations have been warning people that snowmageddon is on its way.

I grew up in Iowa, and I usually laugh at the news coverage of the weather here in Indiana most of the time, because the local stations tend to freak out whenever any kind of precipitation happens in winter. Like, when there’s an inch of snow. I hear that, and I think, “Seriously? It doesn’t even cover the grass!”

You have to understand that I’m used to the weather in the upper-Midwest, where it starts snowing in November or December, and then it keeps snowing, the temperature rarely goes above freezing, and it keeps snowing. The snow accumulates in giant mounds in the parking lots of big chain stores, and in farmer’s fields. When the snow piles get too high, they use dump trucks to cart the snow out of the city and dump it in fields. We even keep track of when the snow mounds finally melt (sometimes not until May). It’s not as bad in Iowa as it is in Minnesota, Canada, Maine, etc, but it’s way worse than in Indiana. I’m not even sure Iowa would call an inch of snow “a snow storm.” I think they’d just say, “We’re going to get some flurries tomorrow.”

This is not Iowa, but it looks the same. Telephone pole for scale.

And so we come to today. The Indiana weather stations are calling for between 8-13 inches of snow starting Sunday, followed by sub-zero temperatures on Sunday night into Monday, with blizzard conditions at times. In Iowa, we call this “Thursday.”

But in Indiana, this is a big deal. And I’m not belittling this storm, because while it’s something that we Iowegians are used to, Hoosiers only get one of these once a decade or so. That means that Hoosiers have a much greater chance of doing something stupid and not surviving this storm. Where an Iowan would look outside and say, “Well, I guess I don’t really NEED to go anywhere today,” a Hoosier might say, “I HAVE to pick up that thing at the store for the dinner tomorrow,” not realizing that, with this storm, the dinner isn’t going to happen.

And so I say this to my lower Midwest friends, including all you Hoosiers: be safe. Get a few gallons of water in case your pipes freeze. Get some blankets in case your heat goes out. If you have to, you can get in your car and run the heater to stay warm, but for goodness sake open the garage door if you do. You aren’t going to starve if you have no food for a few days, but whatever you have in your pantry should be fine. The best thing you can do is just stay put. Nothing at the store is worth your life. If you MUST go out (like, for instance, if you’re a nurse or a doctor going to work), and you go off the road, DON’T leave your car. Use your cell phone to call for help, and wait. Together, we can get through this. And since it’s Indiana, next week temps should be back up in the 40’s and all this white stuff will melt.

Catch you on the flip-side.

EDIT: We survived, and here’s the forecast showing temps in the 40’s this weekend.