Yeah I am pretty sure I live in the desert

"Wrong Wheel Drive (41%)" (rduncan5678)
10/01/2018 at 19:01 • Filed to: None

I was curious so I looked into how much it has rained this summer in my town of Woodland Hills, CA. Yeah it is Socal so it pretty much “never rains”. I always thought this was an exaggeration and maybe it just rains so infrequently that people jokingly say that. Having now lived through my first summer here, I am thoroughly convinced that I live in a desert where rain is just some mythical creature that sleeps for 8 months out of the year. Seriously, it has rained 0.00 inches since April 20th! And it had only rained 0.02 inches on April 19th, otherwise that streak would have been all the way back to March 23rd. Here see some of the data because I love looking at data:

http://piercecollegeweather.com/data/monthly-historical-data/

March was pretty rainy, above average actually. But then it became dry as all hell.

April ha d that tiny bit of rain.

And then literally every month after looked empty. May through September all read 0.00.

Now you may call me silly because of course Socal is the desert but its still perplexing to me because there is lots of plant life compared to like your typical vision of an empty desert with sand dunes and shit. And all of this important right now though because its supposed to rain SIGNIFICANTLY on Wednesday this week. Thunderstorms and shit and the temps will drop a good 20 degrees afterwards, so its definitely a serious weather pattern coming through.

Today I will be getting my snow tires installed on the Subaru. No time to screw around with roads that have that much oil in them from never being washed away. It will be a slip and slide on the commute and I will be leaving early so that I am not stuck in the mess. The canyons will be rock/mud slide bonanza so I will be dreading the highway commute. Will have to post my dash cam footage of the dumb people who spin out into the median.

DISCUSSION (12)

CompactLuxuryFan > Wrong Wheel Drive (41%)
10/01/2018 at 19:13

Won’t it still be in like the 50s at least? I thought snow tires couldn’t handle above like 45.

promoted by the color red > Wrong Wheel Drive (41%)
10/01/2018 at 19:15

It’s funny because I live in the literal desert and it’s actually rained a couple times this summer.

DAWRX - The Herb Strikes Back > Wrong Wheel Drive (41%)
10/01/2018 at 19:37

It’s rained around 20 10 inches here just in September...

ETA: I was using incorrect data. We’ve had about 39 inches total for the year.

Wrong Wheel Drive (41%) > CompactLuxuryFan
10/01/2018 at 20:19

These are all weather Nokians. So not technically a snow tire. Much better than an all season for sure. I can use it legally as a snow tire in winter places though so it is a snow tire to me! It'll regularly be 80+ all month still as well.

CompactLuxuryFan > Wrong Wheel Drive (41%)
10/01/2018 at 20:31

Ah, ok. So all seasons : P

What do you mean “can use it legally as a snow tire in winter places”? Tons of (most?) all seasons are snow+mud rated. They’re still all seasons. I, for one, don’t get all the all season hate. Some all seasons are perfect for you (and me). I run Continental AWSs on my A4 and they’re great in the mostly dry but with wet winters SF and can easily handle weekends in Tahoe. If I ran summers, I wouldn’t be able to do Tahoe.

Wrong Wheel Drive (41%) > CompactLuxuryFan
10/01/2018 at 20:56

This is what I thought too but apparently there is another category, all weather. There aren’t many tires in that category but it’s definitely a thing. These have the three mountain peak thing that real snow tires get and are actually tested for snow. It’s Nokian so they know snow! I didn’t really believe it until I researched it a bit. They won’t be as good as a true snow tire but I’ll also have a 50k mileage warranty and they won’t melt in the heat. I doubt I’ll get 50k of snow ability but my Subaru would also be at 200k then too which is a different kind of scary lol.

I generally dislike anything but a summer tire and winter tire combo but California is unique in that it can be 90 degrees and sunny at home and 20 degrees and snowing at the mountain lol. So a real snow tire would get ruined quickly.

Wrong Wheel Drive (41%) > DAWRX - The Herb Strikes Back
10/01/2018 at 20:59

Exactly what I was used to in NJ which was my home for a long time. There was no wet or dry season. It just rained when it rained. I knew California was this way but I had never experienced it on a day to day basis for this long.

Wrong Wheel Drive (41%) > promoted by the color red
10/01/2018 at 21:00

Do you get the whole monsoon season thing? I know in a lot of real desert places most of the rain actually falls in the summer. It's just in like 2 or 3 really big frigging storms.

Full of the sound of the Gran Fury, signifying nothing. > Wrong Wheel Drive (41%)
10/01/2018 at 21:54

Nah, it’s a mediterranean climate, not a desert, or so I’m told by the annoying and pedantic. If it wasn’t for the modern miracle that is the aqueduct system, that area would border on uninhabitable.

I was born in the IE, moved to OC in the ‘60s when I was an infant, and lived next to LAX from 1991-2012 before moving to the midwest. Out here I don’t have to worry about watering the lawn and garden as nature seems to take care of that for me. And during winter I can save some time by not having to mow...

CaptDale - is secretly British > Wrong Wheel Drive (41%)
10/02/2018 at 13:40

Well technically most of the LA area and basin were all sand dunes and marsh land before people moved here. So I mena desert my not be right, but arid beach yes.

Wrong Wheel Drive (41%) > CaptDale - is secretly British
10/02/2018 at 15:02

But then you see places like Big Sur and Yosemite which are really not all that far away but are like completely different planets. You drive 5 or 6 hours on the East coast in any direction and its pretty much the same environment with maybe some slightly different hills or trees around. That is why it seems so perplexing to me.

CaptDale - is secretly British > Wrong Wheel Drive (41%)
10/02/2018 at 16:20

That is why the East Coast sucks