Tuesday, February 03, 2009

Lovely day today...

...one of the Top 10 for February.

(Yeah, I know it's only the 3rd and that there's less competition for a position on the Top 10 list what with there only being 28 days in the month.... Point is, it was a damn fine day today!)

If you've been following my weather reports for the Aerie for the last week or so, you will recall that last Friday or so we started to get warnings about a possible storm to reach the area on Tuesday (that's today). AccuWeather had three computer models--call them A, B, and C. All the models called for the storm to form off the Gulf Coast of Florida and then head northward. Model A predicted the storm center would head up toward the junctions of Lakes Erie and Huron. Model B said the storm would take aim at Harrisburg and then Syracuse. Model C said it would skirt up the Atlantic coast line.

The prognosticators at AccuHunch said A and C were unlikely and that B was probably the best bet.

Well, if they did in fact place any bets, they lost their shirts today. True, the storm did not follow Models A or C either. In fact, the storm was further out to sea than they thought it would be.

Today's Aerie Weather was absolutely gorgeous! We did not get the inch of snow forecast for yesterday, nor the inch of snow forecast for last night. What we got was a bit of freezing fog over night that left the trees sheathed in crystalline magic when the sun came over the mountain. Then, when the ice and the clouds burned away, we had sunshine all day with temperatures rising to the mid-30s.

A glance at the Weather.com interactive radar map at 4 PM showed some snow coming off the Great Lakes to our west (mostly from Huron and Michigan since Erie is pretty well frozen). This snow was headed south. Then there was some snow on the east coast including New Jersey, NYC, Rhode Island, and Cape Cod. This snow was headed north. Here at the Aerie? The sun was shining and there wasn't much breeze blowing at all.

They (AccuHunch and Weather.com) are forecasting snow showers for the remainder of the week with high temperatures in the low 20s and low temperatures in the single digits. Then we swing back up over the weekend with possible 40s and some rain.

I don't know if I should believe a word they say or if I should go outside and hang a weather rock. (You know the one: If it's wet it's raining, If it's white it's snowing. If it's missing it's windy. Etc.) The rock may be most accurate.

3 comments:

Rev. Paul said...

Or if you can't see it, the sun has set.

If wind is your problem, use the old Missouri solution: a weather stick in the ground. Fewer knots to tie.

JihadGene said...

Glad you had a sun shiny day! It's gonna be 75 here in Coweefornia! ;)

joated said...

With friends in San Diego, relatives in Half Moon Bay, I know something of California. And what I know is this: Despite the lovely weather in the coastal regions to the south, you can either fry an egg on the sidewalk or make ice cream without the ice in some part of the state. Often on the same day. (I'm thinking Bakersfield/Mojave and Mt. Shasta here.)

While individual Californians may, indeed, be charming people, the state has proven to be the antithesis of the saying: The whole is greater than the sum of its parts. If anything, California (as a whole) is far far less than its individual parts.