a weblog of whereabouts & interests, since 2010
Mr. Blue Sky please tell us why
You had to hide away for so long (so long)
Where did we go wrong?
– lyrics from Mr Blue Sky, by Electric Light Orchestra (1977)
Here’s a flock of pigeons – and yes, I’m looking directly at the sun – at 6.00 pm today.
The air quality here in Seattle has improved from ‘Hazardous’ to ‘Unhealthy’. There is a weather system moving in on Friday that should finally bring back blue skies.
There was no good news in the weather forecast tonight.
A low-pressure system in the Pacific will continue to bring in smoke from the south, and the little bit of rain tonight is not going to clear the the foul air that is blanketing the city, either.
It’s going to be a few more days, at least.
It’s 1.15 pm here in Seattle, and there is an eerie orange haze outside.
The sun has yet to break through the combination of marine layer fog and thick smoke from the west coast’s man-made fires. (Calling them wildfires seems like a cop-out, as if humans had no part in it).
There was a place in the greater Los Angeles area that hit 121°F last week. That’s 49.5 °C. And so many fires— the fires that get worse every summer— in California, in Oregon and in Washington State.
Mostly sunny & smoke haze (87 °F/ 30.5 °C) for the city of Seattle tomorrow.
Table Mountain (elevation 3,563 ft/ 1 086 m) in Cape Town, South Africa, has an inch of snow on it.
Snow on the mountain is unusual, but not unheard of (there was snow in 2017).
The cable car up to the top has reopened (with masks required & a limited number of passengers).
We have only had 0.29 in of rain this August (average 0.75 in), and there is no precipitation in the forecast through the end of next week.
Hurricane season has started, and hurricane Laura is bearing down on the Texas & Louisiana coastline. The storm had sustained winds of about 140 miles per hour in the Gulf of Mexico, and will dump up to 10 inches of rain onto areas close to the coast.
Well, we did get up to 98 °F (almost 37 °C) today.
As the sun was setting tonight, there was a startling burst of thunder from the clouds over the city. (Thunderstorms were not mentioned in the weather bulletins that I had followed).
Just a few drops of rain fell here in the city, though – the kind that gets recorded as 1/ 100th of an inch, I suspect.
The weatherman says we may see temperatures as high as 97 °F (36 °C) here in the city tomorrow. I wish I had a swimming pool.
These pictures are from May, taken by a homeowner in Ottawa, Canada. Police and conservation officials arrived to help, but the moose found her way out of the pool and went on her way.
We only got 72 °F (22 °C) here in the city today, but it looks like Sunday will be warm: 90 °F (32 °C).
There is rain on the way for Thursday, says the meteorologists.
Yes! I need it to dissolve and disperse the dry moss treatment that the gutter cleaners had left on my roof.
The dry summer weather continues here in the city (79 °F/ 26 °C today).
There were clouds and a chance of drizzle on Saturday morning, but it stayed dry.
It’s going to be warm (for Seattle, that is) this week — 87 °F (30.5 °C) on Monday, and slightly cooler on Tuesday.
I learned a new word today from our local TV weatherman: graupel.
Graupel is precipitation that forms when tiny, super-cooled water droplets glom onto snowflakes. The soft snowy pellets then fall down to earth.
It was another beautiful day here in Seattle.
I wanted to get a clear view of Mt Rainier, and the observation deck of the Water Tower here in Volunteer Park on Capitol Hill was a good place to go to get that. And hey, no entry fee: it’s free of charge.
There was sun and blue sky all day here in the Emerald City.
Even so, it was only 47 °F (8° C).
As I walked down to the Capitol Hill Library today, though, bright sunlight would bounce off windows from the buildings nearby and onto me, and I instantly felt the radiated heat on my face.
The rain let up a little today, but some cold air moved in from the Pacific, pushing temperatures down again into the mid-40s (6° C).
Thank heavens for the rainbow crosswalks, and the blue and pink street cars, I thought, as I walked along Broadway today. They bring some color — to counter the gray skies and sidewalks.
A break in the rain in January here in Seattle, means you have to jump at it, and go for a walk. We had an even rainier-than-usual start to the year here, with 8.04 in so far at Seatac Airport. The average for Jan. is 5.2 in.
I cut my walkabout in downtown Seattle short today when big raindrops started to come down again.
It was 52 °F/ 11 °C with blue skies when I started out, but grey rain clouds soon swept in from the Pacific.
Wow .. the snowpack levels in the mountains and higher elevations have improved dramatically. Snoqualmie Pass (at 3,000 ft on Interstate 90) had 6.7 feet/ 2.04 m of snow in 6 days.
There should still be more accumulation to come, though.
April 1 of every year is (on average) when the snowpack depths peak, and the snow starts to melt in spring.
