It seems that winter has come to the Midwest, Southwest, Northwest and even into Oklahoma. We are not used to blizzards and sub-arctic conditions in this part of Oklahoma although way out in western Oklahoma it is not all that uncommon. I know that the 'cowboy west' and most of the things that are associated with it has a world wide following.
If you have read any literature or seen TV or movies depicted that era you know that blizzards were things that happened. Sometimes those stories were almost true. Almost.
So, here in Indian Territory we are hit with a major arctic blast (with more coming) and we are prepared.
The TV, newspapers, radio and smoke signals all told us what to expect and they were all correct. We hunkered down in our bunkers to await this catastrophe. It descended upon us like Genghis Khan on a prairie village. Yessir, we made ready. Only those people with an IQ in single digits tried to go anywhere.
Back in the Northeast of the USA, there are still probably many, many cars and trucks still stranded. Autos are off the highway, trucks are sideways, pickups are upside down and the ditches are full of abandoned vehicles.
Those silly TV people were standing out in the worse part of it telling people to stay home. They had to drive out to a highway to show us how bad it was and tell us the highway patrol advised us to not drive. I think we weren't supposed to drive so they would have the highway all to themselves.
But it didn't work. As I said, there were cars everywhere and every which way. I know some of those people were under pressure because their bosses were  (insert expletive deleted here) and told them they had to come to work even though they were not in any emergency service.
For instance, people who work in several shops near us were supposed to report for work. I wonder how many time a phone rang and the voice said, "Boss, I probably won't be in today as I was just frozen solid trying to get to my car and I am dead."  Don't you know that would make some of the hard nosed bosses angry. They would have to find permanent replacements for all those dead employees and that is hard to do on the spur of the moment.
Yesterday morning the thermometer read below freezing. Today the thermometer read further below freezing. Next week's temperature is to be much, much worse! Now hold on! This is Oklahoma, eastern Oklahoma. We are not supposed to have weather this cold. We are not anywhere near Minnesota or Buffalo, New York.
Although we have only had a light snow, the arctic blast we are having is worthy of Minnesota and they would probably take some tire chains and beat the ice off their wind shields before driving to the lake to fish. Those people could sit there in 1.4F and say, "Well, Olaf, I understand it is going to get cold later this week. I think we may have to sleep with all the windows shut.” And Olaf would answer, "Oh, don't you just hate it when that happens, it gets so stuffy when the windows are shut. We just put a sheet over us and try not to get too warm."
Now I do not mind Minnesota and all those other places near the North Pole having 11teen feet of snow as they are very far from God's country.
Down here, much nearer the equator, we believe it is against God's plan for man to die or even be cold during the winter. BUT - there are many people from down here who actually go to the mountains in the winter to ski and otherwise show their lack of common sense.
Skiing was invented as a way of traveling so one could get 'out' of the snow. These deluded people travel hundreds of miles and spend the better part of the national debt so they can be cold all day. Then they can sit around a fire which is burning up our natural resources unnecessarily and brag about how cold they got.
I know some of them fake an injury, pulled muscle or strain so they can stay by the fire and drink (fortified) hot chocolate but still brag when they get back down to where man was designed to live.
Many years ago, on one of my Kerouacian adventures, I was teaching water skiing in the Gulf of Mexico. One of the young boat drivers said he had never seen snow and was asking all about it. When I understood that he had lived his whole life without seeing snow, I asked him to adopt me.