Stationary Front - Defined

Fronts are boundaries between air masses which are huge piles of air that move as a giant, ameba-like mass - yeah, I know, duh, air mass. Because air masses reflect the part of the planet they form over they are all different, in temperature, pressure and moisture content. As each mass moves it collides with other big piles of air and the zone of their collision is a front and that's where the weather battles rage on the planet (the word front was applied to weather about the time that WWI was being waged along battle fronts…). Usually one air mass has more energy/momentum/push than another and moves into the geography formerly occupied by the different air mass: cold air move in, cold front; warm air moves out cold, warm front.
At some point, all air masses lose their push and are stopped or moved in a new direction by another mass. In the summer, in North America, that stall zone is often the mid-Atlantic and that's what we are stuck in today, a weak, stalled air mass that can't get any farther south than the Mason-Dixon line. North of the line, there are no showers and the weather is fairly cool, dry and pleasant but we are south of the line and in the unstable, interaction zone of a stationary front. If you like the weather you are having today, you probably liked yesterday and will like tomorrow, you like stationary fronts! Most people would not.
Today could be the type section (a geology term used to describe all the rock in a formation, from a single point) for a stationary front: cloudy, humid, chance of rain/drizzle/showers/storms, not a lot of temperature change or wind. Everything is stuck or stalled, STATIONARY! Neither air mass has the push to move the other and until a bigger, badder mass comes in late tomorrow to push it all out of here we are stuck in the swampy mess.
A stationary front in the winter occurs for the same reason as it does in the summer but has even less temp change, usually stuck in the mid-30's - high 36, low 35 - and won't rain or snow and you don't see the sun for several days, gross!
So, what can you do about the gross weather today; nothing! Earth is in charge today and everyday and we will either adapt, migrate or die. Those are the rules, today and everyday on Earth. Get out and enjoy the stationary front, it could be hot, dry and 103.

The Siberian Express - Cold!!

Siberia? How in the world? That's the reality, it's a world, all connected, joined, interactive and the jet stream has taken a big loop to the north and the brutal, frigid, dry air of Siberia is spilling into the east coast of North America, deep, deep into the south lands. The western US continues to be mild and snow/rain free with the big jet loop but not the east coast. It really isn't that far (it's actually the short way) from here to Siberia, just right over the north pole and that's what's happening.  The 50 below air of north Asia has been forced over the pole and there's nothing much to slow it down between here and there.
It was 2 here in central Va. this morning and the sun,  while toasty warm behind the glass of the tirehouse, isn't doing much but bouncing off snow back toward space in the outside world. Temps are likely to stay only in the teens today before dropping down below zero tonight, blowing records up (or down) for this late in February.  The light Siberian breeze outside will keep wind chills dangerously low all day and into tomorrow, likely canceling schools yet again for much of Va.
No doubt, naysayers are writing/typing diatribes, as I type this, claiming this cold is proof global warming is a liberal hoax and we should continue fracking, pipelining, driving, burning, wasting every resource if it can increase the bottom line.  I (you saw this coming) disagree: the global warming predictions forecast an increase in EXTREMES; bigger, not necessarily more storms, bigger temps swings, wilder weather with warming. And, while the science is tricky, tooooooo many variables to predict exactly... ice is melting all over earth (maybe not the east coast today) at an increasing rate.  And, ice melts when things get warm, ice sheets form when it gets and stays cold. That isn't rocket science, a simple change of state of the one substance that rules Earth: water. Warm, melting; cold, freezing.
Today (and tomorrow and Saturday) we'll be in the freeze zone, deep freeze, but the big melt will begin Sunday and while winter has a month left on the calendar the warmth of increasingly direct, longer sunlight will win out and force the winds of Siberia back home.  But, not today! Ventures out onto Earth today require all skin covered, and plans for the many issues that deep cold can bring. So, keep your trips short, put out some bird seed and watch the show, it's nasty cold, today on Earth.