Category Archives: Weather

It Reminds Me That Winter Will Last A Good While Longer

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Sure enough, overnight as forecast, the first sizable snow fell since the fun we had around Christmastime. I packed a camera when I was out shoveling this morning.

Been documenting snow on plants for quite a while now. Nothing quite compares to the towering honey locust in the back yard.

Not much wind. That makes it tolerable. Winter winds are sharp, but not quite as much as certain other things, as we’re reminded in As You Like It.

Blow, blow, thou winter wind,
  Thou art not so unkind
     As man’s ingratitude;
  Thy tooth is not so keen,
Because thou art not seen,
     Although thy breath be rude.
Heigh-ho! sing, heigh-ho! unto the green holly:
Most friendship is feigning, most loving mere folly:
  Then, heigh-ho, the holly!
     This life is most jolly.

  Freeze, freeze, thou bitter sky,
  That dost not bite so nigh
     As benefits forgot:
  Though thou the waters warp,
     Thy sting is not so sharp
     As friend remembered not.
Heigh-ho! sing, heigh-ho! unto the green holly…

Windy Chill

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As forecast, full-throated winter came barreling into northern Illinois last night as erratic gusts. The edge of same system that spawned tornadoes in the South? Our wind was brisk but, I’m glad to say, not deadly, unless you passed out naked and drunk outside in some hard-to-spot location, as visiting Florida Man might.

At least it will be a dry cold for the next week or more, weather scientists predict. Any winter day without ice underfoot isn’t half bad.

Late November dusk in these climes.

RIP, Christine McVie. I was much surprised to learn that her maiden name was actually Perfect. I heard years ago that that was her name before marrying John McVie but, in as much as I gave it any thought, believed it was a stage name. Dropping a stage name upon marriage might be a little unusual, but not inconceivable.

Who’s named Perfect? Christine’s father, Cyril Percy Absell Perfect, a concert violinist and music lecturer from near Birmingham, UK, for one. And I assume some generations of his paternal ancestors before him.

“This… name is an example of the common medieval practice of creating a surname from a nickname, in this instance one that originally denoted an apprentice who had completed his period of training,” notes the Internet Surname Database.

“The derivation is from the Middle English ‘parfit,’ meaning ‘fully trained’ or ‘well versed’, from the Old French ‘parfit(e),’ meaning ‘completed,’ ‘perfect,’ ultimately from the Latin ‘perfectus,’ a derivative of ‘perficere’ to finish, accomplish.”

Thanksgiving Break

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Back to posting around November 27. We’ll be home for Thanksgiving, as will Ann. Except for food preparation (and cleanup, which is mostly mine), best not to do too much next week, though I will work the three-day week. A good Thanksgiving to all.

I never get tired of taking back yard pictures, especially when some kind of weather event is visible.

Just a few moments of heavy snow this afternoon that didn’t stick for long. There will be a warming trend next week. Not warm, just warmer than now. A more seasonable chill.

While in the online thickets today, I came across a bill introduced to the U.S. House of Representatives earlier this year.

H.R. 6869 – To authorize the President of the United States to issue letters of marque and reprisal for the purpose of seizing the assets of certain Russian citizens, and for other purposes.

Rep. Lance Gooden (R.-Texas) introduced it, presumably as a novel way to help seize oligarch megayachts. I guess that would count as Congress delegating that function, since if I understand correctly, Article I, Section 8 of the Constitution specifically gives that power to the national Congress. Section 10 bans states from issuing letters of marque and reprisal.

Mr. Gooden’s bill has gone nowhere. Of course, he’s a backbencher (first elected in 2018) in the minority, so Nowheresville is going to be the destination of his proposals, especially ones considered eccentric. Come next year, he’ll be in the majority, but still a backbencher, so I’m not expecting any further action on the matter.

Still, can you imagine? Who would apply to be a privateer against Russian vessels? Maybe Somali pirates, who have been in something of a slump in recent years and who’d like the color of law for a change.

Glazed Morning

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Early this morning, not long after dawn, I woke for the usual reason and from the bathroom window I spotted a thin carpet of snow on the ground. First one of the season.

I took the obligatory picture a couple of hours later, complete with dog.Winterwood, Base Camp

One of those snows in temps hovering at freezing or just above. A lot melted later, but not quite all of it. Hardly the picture of woods on a snowy evening, but we’ll get to that before long.

Last Thursday, knowing that the warm days were running out this year, I stood at about the same spot and captured the yard about an hour before sunset.Golden Deck

Gentle winds blew, with more than a hint of summer.

A Flying Trampoline

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The wind kicked up here on Friday night, with gusts forecast to be as strong as 60 mph, though most of the time the velocity was probably half that. Still strong enough. Such nights make me worry that parts of our wooden back yard fence might take a tumble again, despite various re-enforcements.

Or that items still on the deck might blow elsewhere. I moved some of those beforehand, but as for the fence, there was nothing to do but wait.

Come Saturday morning, I was happy to see the fence intact. The wind was still blowing strongly, though, with periods of rain. At about 3 pm, I looked out into the back yard, and noticed something I didn’t expect.

My neighbor’s trampoline. A particularly strong gust must have turned the trampoline mat into a sail and hoisted it over the chain-link fence between our yards (a different fence from the wooden one). Its appearance in my yard astonished me.

Fortunately, the trampoline didn’t seem to be moving, since it was caught among the larger branches of our sturdy honey locust tree, despite some of the branches falling off.

Before long, my neighbor noticed it, too, and after conferring, we decided that trying to remove it in the still-strong wind would be a bad idea. Time went by and the trampoline didn’t break free from the branches, so our judgment proved correct.

This morning, with only light winds still blowing, we managed to lift it back over the fence. The structure was heavy and cumbersome and clearly ruined, but my neighbor didn’t seem upset about that, explaining that it had been given to him.

“The junkman’s going to get it,” he said, and sure enough he spent a while dismantling it this afternoon. He was glad the only damage done was to a few branches. Me too. We both got off easy.

We didn’t manage to capture its flight on video. Some people do: here’s more than eight minutes of flying trampolines.

Small Insects, Big Rocket

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A really pleasant evening to start September. I could sit out on the deck in a t-shirt and be quite comfortable late into the evening. These nights will be fewer and fewer in the weeks ahead.

Crickets are signing their little hearts out. Wait, do insects have hearts?

Insect Cop says: “Insects do have hearts, but they look very different to our own. The insect heart is a long, tubular structure that extends down the length of the insect body, and delivers nutrient-rich blood to the organs and tissues.

“Insects also have their own version of blood, called haemolymph. Unlike human blood, insect haemolymph does not carry oxygen and lacks red blood cells.”

Back to posting on September 6. It’s good to take Labor Day seriously and not work. We ought to have two labor days, come to think of it — add May 1 as a springtime holiday.

A public domain shot, lifted from NASA. Photographer: Joel Kowsky.

Hope all goes as planned. Yet I can’t help thinking — how is it so different from the Saturn V? An improvement in any way, after 50 years? Hard to say.

Why orange? Black and white were good enough for the Saturn V, after all. Turns out it’s a weight issue, and with Moon rockets, every ounce counts.

“The orange color comes from insulation that covers the vehicle’s liquid hydrogen and oxygen tanks,” noted an article published by the Planetary Society about seven years ago.

“This is the same reason that the Space Shuttle’s external fuel tank was orange. The first two shuttle flights, STS-1 and STS-2, in 1981, featured tanks painted white to protect the shuttle from ultraviolet light while sitting on the launch pad. But after engineers concluded the protection was unnecessary, the white paint was discarded, freeing up 600 pounds of weight in the process.”

One more thing, NASA. Get a better name for the rocket. Artemis and Orion are good; they go together in history and lore. But Space Launch System? That just doesn’t have the panache of Saturn.

Not Much of a Heat Wave

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Heat wave! Plus rain in the wee hours tomorrow. The weathermen and women are no doubt excited. But it’s a small heat wave. It won’t even been 80 degrees F. by Saturday. Good timing, I’d say.

Workers showed up this morning and, as predicted, started making noise. Digging a hole in a modern street will do that.infrastructure
infrastructure

The pipe went in when I had other things to do, so I didn’t watch it go in. Still, it was soon buried, though leaving a rough patch of gravel to be buried itself when the village gets around to repaving the street.infrastructure

The good part is that it only took them about three hours to plant the pipe in the earth, which I hope will do what it’s suppose to do, such as keeping storm water away from my property.

(Very) Local Infrastructure

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A sizable and fast-moving storm blew through Monday evening around 6, complete with strong wind, heavy rain and a municipal siren warning of a tornado that did not, fortunately, materialize. Second time for the sirens in the last few weeks. Is the village quicker to sound them than before? It certainly seems that way, but I have no data to prove it.

Clear and hot today. As in, above 90 F. But it’s a Northern summer: temps will drop toward the end of the week.

Usually I don’t mind working at home. Usually it’s pretty quiet, except when the dog gets excited. Summer bonus: I can repair to our deck from time to time. Even on days like today, our honey locust provides excellent shade.

Soon it isn’t going to be quiet. A major machine arrived across the street from my house today, and more to the point, across the street from the side of my house that includes my home office.

Those pipes will be installed, and eventually, the street will be resurfaced. I predict noisiness in the near future.

I’ve been warned. The village sent us a mailing at least a month ago. Still, it’s a mild surprise when the equipment actually shows up. Last week, a fellow came by and cut enigmatic (to me) lines in the street and some driveway entrances.

He only took a few minutes, but it was loud. A taste of things to come.

Birchwood South Park

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Finally a warm day on Saturday — after a miserable, wet Friday — then cool on Sunday, but warm again on Monday. So warm today, in fact, that the ground was dry enough for me to mow the lawn for the first time this year, and grill brats in the back yard, despite gusting winds.

Bonus: Even after dark this evening, I could sit around the deck comfortably in a t-shirt. So I spent some time outside reading about G-men trying to track down the loose 1933 Double Eagles, as mentioned before.

Last week, before the warm up, it was still pleasant enough on Wednesday to seek out a new place to walk: Birchwood South Park in Palatine.Birchwood Park South

A good place to see the spring greening.
Birchwood South Park

It took a while, but eventually we realized that the water in the middle of the park wasn’t a permanent feature, but the result of the many recent rains.Birchwood South Park Birchwood South Park

Including a flooded baseball/softball field.
Birchwood South Park

This year’s rainy spring is more than just an impression.

“This spring has seen more rainy days than any other spring in the past 63 years,” NBC Chicago reports.

“While a rainy springtime in the city isn’t anything new, this year has seen more perception than average, according to the National Weather Service, the average precipitation in Chicago from March to May is 6.93 inches. This year, we’ve seen 10.31 inches.”