SlatRat.com
The Daily Doings of Steph

It’s April! We’re deep in the midst of Breakup. Eau de Dog Poop permeates the air. Dust, grit, mud, slush, and cruddy snow are everywhere. Cars are unrecognizable mud bombs.

All of this can mean only one thing! It’s time for the Westchester Lagoon Ice Classic!

It’s time to break out the weather almanac, consult weather service predictions, check your horiscope, try to figure out if this is an El Nino or a La Nina year, read the tea leaves, ponder the state of the pussy willows, count the number of returning geese and assess the impact of global warming - all in an attempt to be the winner of this year’s Ice Classic!!!!!

Weatherwise, we had a fantastic winter here in Anchorburg. Just a few days of below zero temps. But no Chinooks and tons of snow all winter long. So, what does this all mean for the prognostication process? This time last week, the Coastal Trail was almost bare. However, we had almost a foot of snow on Wednesday that complicated matters. As of today, all the new snow is melted: the Coastal Trail is back down to asphalt and there are now some open grass areas on lawns. However, our yard still has a solid covering of two feet of snow.

The rules (such as they are) are listed below. You’ve got a little bit of time to get your guess in, but don’t wait too long. That ice could go out and leave you behind!

Rules:

1. The participant must guess the date the ice goes out of the Lagoon.
2. Each participant gets only one guess.
3. Date for entries closes at 11:59 PM ADT on April 26, 2010.
4. A guess consists of just a date - no time. I refuse to install a timing tripod on the Lagoon.
5. I will check the ice several times each day.
6. ALL the ice must go out. It sometimes goes out in chunks - but chunks don’t count.
7. Participants must supply their e-mail address. This is so I can contact you if you win.
8. If more than one person guesses the winning date, each winner will get a full prize - up to 4 winners. If there are more than 4 winners, the winning 4 will be selected based upon earliest entry into the contest.
9. All judge’s decisions are final and I (Steph) am the judge.
10. Ah - the prize. It’s a good one - a $25 gift certificate to Amazon.

Voting:

1. Voting will be done through the comments feature.
2. The voting comments button is at the bottom of this post.
3. Click on the comments button and submit your vote.
4. The cool thing is that everyone will be able to see everyone else’s vote - hopefully there will be a lot of them.

Notes and Hints:

1. In 2009, the went out on May 2nd and 3rd. There was a large herd of co-winners: Kim, Leland, Rick, Gordon, and Sean.
2. In 2008, the went out on May 10th. The winning psychic was Brad!
3. In 2007, the went out on May 2nd. We had two co-winners: Rick and Elliott.
4. In 2006, the ice went out on over a two day period: May 3rd and May 4th. Our winners were Gordon, Da Ski Boy, BJ, and Sean!
5. In 2005, the ice went out on April 29th and the winning prognosticator was Cory.
6. In 2004, the ice went out on May 4th a day on which we set a record high temperature of 66 degrees. The 2004 winners were Dr. L., and Phil.
7. In 2003, the ice went out very very early, April 26th The 2003 winners were Brad and Phil.
8. In 2002, the ice went out quite late: May 10th and the winners were Erin and Brad.

If I got to vote, I’d vote for May 1st. It just feels like it’s going to be early this year.
Vote away.