Off Topic Discussions

[Sam_AMD]

Call me crazy, but I did come to the office today!

I drove at about 25 mph, it took me about 20 mins to get here instead of the usual 9 mins. I noticed dozens of broken/collapsed trees on the roads (the big branches of all the trees in my front yard have collapsed). And, to no surprise, there was very, very little traffic. In fact, I believe I was the only one on the roads at 7:00 am. Crossing the freeway was strange because I crossed into a dark neighborhood – no power. I had to drive around multiple trees that have fallen in the middle of the roads.

When I arrived at the office I noticed that there were three cars parked in the lot, and said to myself “This reminds me of the COVID-19 days…but on ice!”.

I’m safe and my team is safe too. They are at home as I post this post! They’re out of power, but I’m sure the folks responsible for our power are diligently working on restoring it as fast as they can. No power = no heat! Not good. I had a family stay with me during the 2019 ice storm; they had no power for 4 days.

[cpurpe91]

It's good to hear everyone is okay. Hopefully you all aren't going to face too much more of this. While I love snow, ice is dangerous. Stay safe and try to keep warm. 

[jamesc359]

Meanwhile somewhere Idaho...

This was Monday morning. We've been having some crazy weather too.

Stay warm and drive safe @Sam_AMD, slick roads can be perilous!

[Sam_AMD]

I'm my goodness, I thought we have it bad here in Austin! "Winter has come"

[Key-J]

Oh man,

Glad to hear you and the team are safe.

It is funny yesterday I had a beautiful blue sky and sun - this morning I woke up to Snow Snow Snow.  Driving was slippery, and it still has not stopped.

Once I get to lunch I will try to take a picture to share!

[Sam_AMD]

I'll tell you, the coldest weather I've ever experienced was a snowboarding trip in Toronto! To my surprise, the Toronto area does not have any "real" mountains for skiing/snowboarding. But I managed to find some slopes about 2 hours north of the city. It was January, the temperature dropped to 37 C below zero. I had icicles in my beard. 

[Key-J]

 i wish I had an awesome view, but that's at least 3 inches of fluffy fluffy snow in my backyard

[mengelag]

Where are you at in Canada? I'm in Calgary myself.

[jamesc359]

I remember when I was a kid my dad would come in with icicles dangling from his beard. Now that I'm growing my own beard I've got them too! It's quite the experience!

[johnnyenglish]

Now that's cold!!! I grabbed another blanket after seeing those photos. 😨

Be safe out there! I can't imagine that kind of cold weather, the worst we got was like -5ºC


We have no ice here yet, well, maybe up north but I live near the coast in the center so the bad guy is humidity, always high even when it doesn't rain...

However, we do get flash floods with just a bit of rain...

[eebiii]

That is crazy! Hop in the canoe to get to work?

[johnnyenglish]

Rubber boats were actually used for some people, yikes.

I just went back to my house, luckily, IT can do most of the work remotely.

...just crossing the fingers for the safety of the datacenter and fiber optics infrastructure 🤣🤐

[eebiii]

Wow, glad everyone is good! 

I've heard about those nasty ice storms in Texas. They can be brutal.  I know this probably doesn't make you feel better, but I've had 2ft of snow in my backyard since November. It just won't melt. The dog is running out of places to go to the bathroom. lol

[neon]

Glad to see that you got in safely.

However, I am concerned that there appears to be a monitor behind you that looks like someone/something took a bite out of its corner. If something unknown is running around AMD HQ chomping on monitors, then what could happen next?

[bobpi]

When I was in the USAF, I was stationed in Alaska near Fairbanks and was there during a record setting -86F. That was the official record at the Fairbanks airport but it was more like -90F at the air base.

Also saw a thermometer that said 150F in the shade during a summer in Kuwait. I was in the tail end of the war to liberate Kuwait (Gulf War 1).

[Sam_AMD]

That's just too extreme! I'm assuming going outside even for a minute is out of the question (in both scenarios). What did you wear when you were in Alaska?

[bobpi]

I wore a parka, parka pants, 2 sets of gloves, and 2 sets of mittens with mukluks or  insulated snow boots . I sill got frostbitten fingertips because I was doing maintenance with just my thin inner gloves sometimes as quickly as possible in Alaska during the cold times.

I had plenty of outside time in Kuwait. I just had to make sure and drink copious amounts of water and stay out of the sun as much as possible.

[Vynski]

Man you went from one extreme to the other.  

[Axxemann]

@Sam_AMD I'm gonna chuckle a little. The cold is typical for me from October-April. It'll get down to -40 on the regular. I've even seen -50 (Celsius) more than once.

We even had freezing rain over the weekend to cap off a week where we were hitting single digit daytime highs, and just below 0 at night. Then the freezing rain came, then it turned to snow, then the bottom fell out and we're back down to -15 as a daytime high. We had the real bitter cold in December. We're bound to get more before February is out.

[Sam_AMD]

Wow! I guess I'm spoiled. I lived in California for a long while (in the Bay Area and in LA). I'd never experienced extreme weather as here in Austin. One year, while in LA, I spend X-mas day at the beach. And in SF, the fog, wind, and wet surfaces (especially over the bridges) made my morning commute "exciting" (I'm being sarcastic) because I rode an R1 to work every day. And that's why I stopped riding motorcycles, I had too many close calls almost every day. 

[Axxemann]

I've been snowed on every month of the year here in central Alberta. Not EVERY year, mind you, but yes, I have gotten snowed on in the summer. It's even more unpredictable in the mountains. I was on a 4x4 excursion in late July... three valleys crossed: One was sunny and HOT (32 C) the second was pouring rain (great because it kept the dust down) the third... SNOW. We were going to park for the day and camp in that valley. We opted to press on until after dark to get somewhere that wasn't wet or snowed in!

Coldest I ever rode a motorcycle was -12C, with a -20 windchill value (no idea what my actual windchill was while riding.) Thankfully it was just COLD and there wasn't any snow on the ground in early April. I had to get the bike home because I didn't want to pay another month's worth of storage. I had to wear my polypro base layer, a henley, sweatshirt, and have both the quilted and rain liners in my motorcycle jacket, glove liners, my kevlar jeans and a skidoo cowl and I still froze half to death. Still beat riding in the rain, though!

[johnnyenglish]

Breathtaking. Amazing place!

I'm a bit tired of the city life, wanting to move to a relaxing place for a some time now, but I can't yet.

[mengelag]

I'm in Calgary @Axxemann . Are you in Red Deer if you're in central AB? I'm starting to meet a few people from Berda, almost enough to pull off a LAN party. Thought?

[Axxemann]

Edmonton. Bit of a hike for me. My back and hips keep me from doing trips longer than about an hour these days. 

[Amber_AMD]

Hey everyone, 

I'm alivvveee!! We lost power for almost 24 hours - luckily we got it back on last night. Wally is still waiting for his to come back on, but has his fireplace to keep him warm! 

Roads are still icy and a bit dangerous. I think Texas needs to start figuring out how to handle this cold weather because it keeps happening. 😞 

Hope everyone is staying warm or enjoying the good weather they have! 

I'm ready to dive back into work today 🤗

[Amber_AMD]

Our little tree is hanging on for his life - 

 

Here's a video of what it looked like yesterday when we lost power - excuse Opie for taking care of business in my video 🤣

[Key-J]

Oh man, that isn't just snow. That is a full-on ICE storm.

Thank you for the update on Wally, and glad to hear that you are doing well! That tree is definitely feeling some pain.

Here in BC, we have lots of snow and some Ice storms - but you definitely don't think about that kind of weather when you hear "Texas".

Here is a better picture from the last 48h snowfall here in BC.

[Axxemann]

Last time I was down in the lower mainland (early 2020, pre-RONA) they had -7 and got a huge dump of snow. Driving around downtown Vancouver was a riot! Not a plow or sander to be seen, not even a grader to blade the snow off to the sides. All the locals were looking at the nutcase in the white Nissan NV taking corners sideways with the full advantage of NO ONE being on the roads. I think they figured out I was used to it once they saw the lack of a front plate, and once I went by: Alberta: WILD ROSE COUNTRY. I think the nicest day was the Friday when I had to double back to Surrey from Chilliwack, then drive all the way back home. And of course, as I got closer to home, it got COLDER, but I missed the -50s we had that winter.

[johnnyenglish]

Do you have some sort of backup for times like these?

Battery pack or generator?

I can't really remember the last power outage but the electricity price is skyrocketing so hard that I'm considering getting some solar panels and a battery pack.

[Amber_AMD]

Honestly, we do not... Unfortunately it took us 2 times to go through this to realize we need some kind of back up in case this happens again. Definitely will be looking into some options in the future! 

Also, solar pannels sound SO worth it!! If we owned our house, I would definitely consider it. 

[YourLocalRyzen777]

oof

[rtbh99]

i just went for a bike ride in 32 degree weather here in arizona. it was pretty nice except i dont have gloves, had to ride with my hands in my pockets for a decent bit of the ride(dont worry, no cars were harmed)

[Wally_AMD]

I'm alive, Red Team! I finally got into the AMD office and my fiancee texted me that we got power back on 10 min. ago. That means we were without power for almost 6 days... cabin fever was starting to set in. Thankfully, we had a fireplace, plenty of firewood, and candles to keep us going through the days/nights. 

We jumped in our car for warmth and to charge our phones and tablets, and even drove around to coffee shops that were open to use the Wi-Fi to download some shows/movies.

Unfortunately, we had to throw all of our food away from our fridge (we had just gone grocery shopping 2 days before we lost power) and our yard was a warzone of fallen branches and broken fences.

Here's a few pics of the event:

After all our tree limbs were cut and put on the curb.Fence down.Heard a loud crack in the night, woke up to this in our front yard.        My dog, Ozzy, kept our spirits up the whole time!

[Key-J]

Oh man that is crazy! Happy to hear you guys are good and were able to manage!

[mengelag]

and this @Wally_AMD is why you need to have a portable Mini-ITX rig. In the case of a Power outage, just grab it and go to where there is wifi! Glad you're safe though.

[Vynski]

Ozzy looks like a great snuggler.  I do hope Ozzy is staying warm.

[eebiii]

Wow! Did the house get damaged? I know what you're going to be doing over the next couple weekends. 

[mengelag]

I'll trade you weather @Sam_AMD , Any time you really want to experience winter, Canada has you covered lol!

[Axxemann]

That looks like a light flurry, man! You have to show them the REAL dumps!

[Key-J]

I'm going to have to look back through my photos to see when we got some crazy snow here in the Okanagan.