It's funny that you say your folks were better prepared because they'd lived in Oklahoma - we had a blizzard here the day before Christmas and just about everyone around here was completely UNprepared. I didn't even know about it until about two hours in and drove home in a white-out without anything in my car to help if I slid off of the road like half of the people I passed. I spent four days after that hiding in my house.

Whereas it probably didn't phase anyone in Minnesota.

I do think weather knowledge has cycles, though - I remember a lot more snow when I was little, but we haven't had very much for years, and then BLIZZARD!!!!