Sunny SoCal

This morning the far reaches of North Santa Barbara County and most of San Luis Obispo County were under a severe weather watch. As I turned on the morning news with breakfast in-hand, the first thing I caught was a sentence ending in "black ice."

This is California, isn't it?

Meanwhile, later in the day it snowed on LA's west-side:

NBC4 forecaster Fritz Coleman said the mixture of precipitation in West Los Angeles at about 3 p.m. included a dusting of snow. Residents in West Los Angeles said the snow accumulated in parking lots, on cars and around palm trees near Wilshire and Santa Monica boulevards and other areas.

Most of the snow fell south of Sunset Boulevard and just east of the 405 Freeway. Residents told NBC4 that several inches of snow fell in their yards.

The last snowfall recorded at Los Angeles International Airport was in January 1962, according to the National Weather Service. Trace amounts -- less than 0.5 inches -- were reported, according to the NWS.

Snow fell earlier Wednesday in Malibu and caused traffic problems on the area's winding and narrow roads. Sleet made driving treacherous on Kanan Dume Road, a steep route through the Santa Monica Mountains where it's more typical to see beach-bound cars loaded with surfboards than a snowplow.

In the 30-ought years I lived in and around Thousand Oaks, we saw light and quick-disappearing dustings of snow at least twice that I recall, occuring roughly about 15 years or so apart. Which makes this winter a prime candidate.

Don't let the Rose Parade fool you. We occasionally 'do weather' here in Sunny SoCal.