The Weather Genius, otherwise known as the moron behind me at Duane Reade



Photo by Eric Skiff, via Flikr

On the eve of the arrival of one of my BFFs, who's flying in from sunny Barcelona, New York City is a shitshow. It’s cold. It’s windy. And the heavens are spewing ice pellets.

When I got off the subway and blew across the street as I fought to keep my umbrella right-side-in while dodging other armed and dangerous pedestrians, I quickly nipped into Duane Reade to get honey for my tea. I was on the massive line waiting to pay when idiocy unraveled behind me in the form of an annoying couple. Obviously tourists, they’d stopped in to buy an umbrella and hats.

“I can’t believe it’s hailing,” the girl said.

“Hailing? It’s not hailing. It’s raining. It’s too warm for hail,” her boyfriend said. I sighed loudly. I had just been pelleted by the “non” hail myself.

“Looks like ice balls to me,” the girl continued. “Look, the girl in front of us has ice balls in her hair.” My hand automatically reached to pat my wet, and yes, ice-laden, head.

“Ugh. It is NOT ice balls. It has to be 32 degrees or below for ice. It’s too warm. Don’t be so stupid,” the annoyer continued. I held my breath and counted to ten.

“But look at her hair.”

“That’s just a water droplet. It’s not ice.”

I turned around. “OK, let’s get something straight. There IS ice in my hair,” I said.

The girl cracked a smile while her boyfriend turned red in the face. I ignored his ‘tude and continued. “Ice forms up there…” I said, pointing up. “So it doesn’t have to be 32 degrees or under on the ground for it to form in the clouds. Pah-lus, I was stuck in a hailstorm in Barcelona last year, where golf ball sized ice took chunks out of my plant leaves and left my garden looking like a war zone – AND it was summer. So it obviously doesn’t need to be freezing for hail or ice balls. Mmmkay?”

I left the baffled couple behind and paid for my honey. As soon as I got to work, I googled ice pellets and hail to make sure I was right. Nothing worse than fighting an idiot by being a bigger idiot. Luckily Wikipedia, a sound source if ever there was one, backs me up:

Ice pellets form when a layer of above-freezing air is located between 1500 meters (approximately 5,000 feet) and 3000 meters (approximately 10,000 feet) above the ground, with sub-freezing air both above and below it.