You can't find a snow blower. Grocery stores are empty of milk and other necessities. The video store had a line of 35 people being served by one poor clerk. Every Disney movie has been checked out because kids won't attend school during the BIG one. All this reminds me of how important credibility is.
People believe weather forecasts, although forecasts prove to be wrong as often as they are right.
I can relate several incidents in my experience when a BIG one was due and everyone hunkered for something that never came. There was just one incident when a BIG one was forecast and it did hit. I was working in New York, however, where it only sprinkled. I did not see the BIG one until the train took me closer to home where the sky grew black and clouds scudded tree tops. The BIG one turned out to be a narrow band that smashed the small area it passed and barely scratched anywhere else.