Moni, It was one of those on-and-off warnings. One day they thought it would hit us hard, and then another day they said it would go farther south and then they came back and said we 'might' get 1" to 4" but they were leaning more toward the 1". So, here we sit with over 6" on the ground (I haven't measured it lately) and more falling. The problem is that the forecast models were all over the place, and the meteorologists had to decide which model or models they had the most confidence in. A lot of them chose the wrong one! LOL It is a wet snow and our temps have hovered between 29 and 32 degrees all afternoon, so some of it has melted even as more has fallen. It is quite lovely but I hope it goes away soon. My Dixondale onions ship next week. All the birds in southern OK are currently eating out in the yard.....we're having a wild bird convention with everything from goldfinches (several dozen of them at three finch feeders) to cardinals, blue jays, blue birds, starlings, black-capped chickadees, doves, sparrows, crows, grackles, etc. There are birds everywhere. I need to go outside and let the 'garage dogs' out to run and play. I've been letting them out for about 15 minutes every couple of hours all day long. They like the snow, but they don't like it for long. I'll measure the snow while I'm out. Down in the D-FW area, I believe today's snowfall makes this the snowiest year since sometime in the 1970s. I know sleet and snow flurries have fallen in the College Station, TX, area and than across parts of Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama and into northern Florida. They should have real snow in some of those places tonight and tomorrow. Every day it seems like someone in the USA is having snow, and I guess this is the southern states' turn. Dawn

Hi, We are dealing with an issue similar to this one, only the HVAC closet is on the ground floor - the lines were cloged and the emergency line was also not working. The water not only backed up to the pan, but also drained into the pedestal box and one of the HVAC lines that hung below the unit. In our experience, it is never a good thing to have the AC off. Regardless of how dry it seems, mold can grow in humid areas. I would recommed you get the pan installed and have your HVAC guy out to keep it running. In the meantime, I agree with another posting on getting the dehumidifier in. Regarding the insurance company. They are basically trying to save the company money only and do not have your best interest at heart. I haven't heard of any insurance company painting whole rooms or casing not damaged by the incident. In your case, it might be better just to either do the rest yourself or have whomever painting finish the rest - via an additional quote - so you know exactly what they want to charge. I hope you get good sincere workers in there. On another note, the home we are working on also had window leaks. Everything went unchecked and the maintenance person that did painting and caulking simply covered and filled rot up. The house now has primary and secondary termite colonies, not something to take lightely and a true lesson for the absentee owners (vacation home). I would seriously think about visiting your vacant home periodically - make sure your windows are not leaking, weather stripping on doors is in good shape, your HVAC will need monitoring. You will also want to think about a few other things. When a house is vacant, the sewer line does not get flushed out - there's a trap (elbow) at each fixture - sink, toilet, tub, etc. I believe this would be the case with your own septic system, so please ignore if you are on some city or county sytem (unless someone corrects me there). To continue, your best bet is to flush the toilets and run water in your sinks and tubs - not for long, just a few seconds. It just simply puts water back in the elbow, preventing sewer gases from coming into the house. Prevention can go along way. As they say, "an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure" Good luck, I hope you can sell. Remember curb appeal also - make sure the yard is taken care of - it does go along way and when someone stops by if they see its taken care of outside, they will assume it has been inside. Small details will also get noticed. Go room by room and just check small details, do cabinet and regular doors hang and shut correctly, what about drawers - these are things that people will look at, minor yes but if they can't pull apart your house, it may satisfy them with what they see first hand. Another HVAC tip - even though the house is not getting used, make sure to change the filters. You could get the reusable ones or just use the paper ones. At our house we purchased reusable and vacum and then rinse the extra dust out (they have a plastic frame with washable screen). Check around the perimiter of your home outside also - keep it clear. If there's a moisture issue, try and get it diverted or fixed, termites love moisture. Well, hopefully I have been helpful. - Rachael

The dew point is merely the temperature to which the air would have to cool (at a constant pressure and constant water vapor content) in order to reach saturation. Then, when saturation occurs, depending on other factors and how they come together, you can get fog, clouds, precipitation, dew or frost. Your dew point can be lower than your air temperature but it is never greater than your air temperature. When your air temperature and dewpoint are very close or the same, the air generally has a high relative humidity value. The dewpoint can affect how comfortable or uncomfortable we humans (and other animals) feel. When dewpoints are lower than 65 degrees, we generally feel relatively comfortable. When dewpoints are 65 degrees or higher, we start to feel sticky and uncomfortable. Dewpoint is not the same as Relative Humidity. RH values indicate how close the air is to being saturated. Frost is caused by radiational cooling, which happens as the earth loses heat (generally because the sun has set) and temperatures drop below the freezing point at ground level. There are different degrees of frost and you can see anything from light damage to no damage to heavy damage. A freeze is caused by advective cooling. Normally this occurs when a mass of cold air moves into the area (via the passage of a cold front, for example, with cold Arctic air) Freezes and frosts damage plants in different ways. Oh, and the use of the term hard freeze generally means temperatures are expected to fall below 28 degrees for along enough period to do harm. I haven't read up on this in a few years, but the NWS has guidelines for the issuance of each different type of freeze, hard freeze or frost warning. They only use them during the growing season. A Frost Advisory is issued when the predicted temperature is expected to fall to 36 degrees or lower in the next 3 to 30 hours. Please understand that you can have frost even at temperatures up to 40 degrees. I often see patchy frost at 37 or 38 degrees, but only rarely at 39 and I am not sure if I've ever seen it at 40 degrees. A Freeze Warning is issued if there is forecast to be an 80% or higher chance that the air temperatures are expected to fall to 32 degrees or low in the next 3 to 30 hours. A Hard Freeze Warning is similar to a Freeze Warning, but with the temperature threshold being 28 degrees. Sometimes the actual air temperatures do not behave as forecast (last night is an example of this) and the NWS has to hurriedly issue a Frost Advisory, Freeze Warning or Hard Freeze Warning with no notice, putting it into effect immediately.

The plants will be fine. Keep them from freezing. They will start growing more once the air, and soil temperatures warm up, and stabilize. Some of my best producing plants lost all of their leaves more than once. Oh and I would skip the bucket covers. They dry faster without the cover, it will trap moisture, and condensation will build up. Miracle Grow garden soil has very little fertilizer in it. If you want to do fertilizer follow the directions on the label. I prefer to use synthetic water soluble fertilizers. My wife hangs clothes out in the back yard and I used fish emulsion once. After she smelled it she made the rule of no stinky stuff. I used Miracle Grow blue (all purpouse) for a couple of years. Then I switched to Foliage Pro.