El Niño update

 

 

 First week of Meteorological winter, and the holiday lights are welcome in the long nights and earliest sunsets of the year now. The December Solstice on December 21.  The high temperature was 51 on December 7  under cloudless blue sky and sun. It was the warmest December 7 in 42 years, since 52 degrees in 1981! 

The sunset was spectacular, too. It was a beautiful day---but it didn't feet like December.  Today, December 8, it was even warmer, almost 60 degrees!  Yes, unseasonably warm.  Enjoy it while it lasts, people say. And if you are from Chicago,  you may say, we'll be paying for this in January. 

Is this part of the El Niño effect?  Global warming?  Climate change?  

Yes, weather folks are confident  in a strong El Niño lasting through the spring. This means a milder winter here,  and not as much snow.

Global warming caused by human activity affects the ocean waters, too, which in turn affect the jet stream, and the polar vortex, and weather all over the world.

Global warming and climate change are not the same thing. Global warming is part of climate change. Due to warmer temperatures, hurricanes may be more extreme, and intensify more rapidly.

 Climate change is weather over time, a pattern of more severe storms, heat waves, droughts and flooding. 

These changes affect everyone, everywhere--from melting icebergs in Antarctica, to fall foliage in New England,  fewer bees, more mosquitos, changes in crops and timing of flowering cherry trees.  

We are all part of these changing climate patterns,  even as private jets fly into Dubai.

 

A Hazy Shade Of Winter

White gray sky,  a cold wind,  brown leaves, and patches of snow. It's a  hazy shade of winter,  today. Maybe you remember this song by Simon and Garfunkel---

 

November Sky

November  sky--white-gray and winter feel, bare trees and brown leaves and cold wind.  Historically, November is the cloudiest month in Chicago.  November sky---The stormy iron-gray  sky and hurricane-force winds  that sunk the Edmund Fitzgerald  in Lake Superior forty-eight years ago on November 10.

But not today--the sky today---sun and cloudless blue!  And the leaves falling in that light, and the colors on the almost-bare branches of the trees...There's a slight breeze chasing the leaves down the streets.  It's a beautiful  fall day. 

Yes, the sky really looks  more blue  in the fall. According to Accuweather, this is due to  drier air, and the angle of the sun at this time of year.  The contrast with the colored leaves is also a part of it.

This period of mild,  dry weather  after the first frost is still sometimes called Indian Summer in North America.   In European folklore, this time before winter cold really sets in has other  names--little summer, poor man's summer, grandmother summer.  You can read more  here.

It is said the veil between the worlds grows thin when the leaves start to fall, and the sky is wide open and blue. And maybe we can imagine spirits, ancestors and loved ones,  dancing with  the leaves....

Update  November 15---another beautiful blue sky day---this is the longest streak of sun and blue sky days in mid-November in 22 years! 

Halloween Snow

  

 

 

 

Apigiannagaut  is a word in the Inuktitut language for the first snow of autumn.  Here in the  Chicago area, we  got the first snow of autumn  on October 31 for Halloween. 

Yes, snow on the carpet of fallen colored leaves. Snow on the pumpkins and skeleton decorations. Snow on the bridges and grassy areas. Sometimes, it was light as the falling leaves. Sometimes it was like being in a snow-globe, snow swirling around in gusts of wind.

Snow squalls they called it. Sun then snow, then sun again. 

Sometimes, the snow looked like tiny white balls. There's a name for this, too--graupel.

According to Wikipedia----"Graupel, also called soft hail, hominy snow, or snow pellets, is precipitation that forms when supercooled water droplets in air are collected and freeze on falling snowflakes, forming 2–5 mm balls of crisp, opaque rime.  Graupel is distinct from hail and ice pellets in both formation and appearance. "

 It's not the first time we've had Halloween snow.  The last time  was in 2019, when 3.4 inches of snow fell in Chicago!  

Today, November 1, a clear blue sky, and cold. Still some snow on the leaves and the grass. Sun on melting snow and falling leaves....

El Niño winter forecast

 

According to the NOAA forecast, this will be a strong El Niño winter, possibly the strongest ever recorded.   El Niño winters are milder and less snow than average in the midwest.  You can read the forecast here.

 Snow lovers, don't worry--there will be some snow! The average snow fall for the Chicago area is 36 inches.

What is El Niño?  According to National Geographic--

El Niño is a climate pattern that describes the unusual warming of surface waters in the eastern equatorial Pacific Ocean. Trade winds and atmosphere are also impacted by El Niño.

In fact, warmer Pacific water around the equator affects the weather patterns around the world.  The jet stream is also affected.   According to the National Weather Service--

During El Niño the southern jet stream strengthens especially across the eastern Pacific Ocean. This allows more moisture to be transported onshore in the Southwestern United States and generally more storminess across the southern part of the country in general.

What will this El Niño winter bring?  We'll see....

 

 

 

Leaves and Rain

Once again, the seasons turn the colors of the leaves. It's a bountiful year for acorns. A mast year, it's called.  So many acorns!  So many varieties of  oak trees. 

Autumnal thoughts. change and the impermanence of things. the gardens in their overgrown splendor and ruin. Thoughts turn to next spring, planting crocus bulbs, moving peonies.  The hope of next spring lilacs.

Next year's calendars are already here, on display alongside the Halloween decorations and candy.   

The new moon and the eclipse of October 14 has passed.  It was overcast in Chicago unfortunately, but there are  marvelous photos online. Here are some, from Space. com.

The moon is a waxing crescent now, visible in the evening sky. The next full moon will be on October 28. the Hunter's Moon, and a partial lunar eclipse!

This is the Ghost Season, the  haunted season of pumpkins and skeletons, witches and spider webs. We are spooked by plastic bags that could be ghosts, the creak of a gate, footsteps in the dark. 

We are haunted by past Octobers, by leaves and rain. We are haunted too, by history, by plagues and wars. 

Early October Days

 Early in October, there are days like yesterday when the sky is cloudless blue, and the light is almost blinding in its clarity. The gold of falling leaves in that October light,  a vision of poets and artists.  It is a day for glorious things. 

Carpenters, painters, roofers, gardeners, people walking their dogs, all of us in that golden light, feeling the  beauty of the world, of being alive here now. 

And then there are days like today, when the overcast gray sky is like a blanket. Heard, not seen, a line of geese heading south. The air is surprisingly chilly, and jackets and hoodies and layers are the outfits of the day. 

It's a moody and introspective day, a day without shadows, the kind of day when we turn inside, the comfort of roomy sweaters and soup simmering on the stove. 

This is autumn now.  It still feels like summer some days, the last of the ripening tomatoes. Some days, our thoughts turn to winter, and snow and cold. Leaves are starting to turn colors. Halloween decorations are out already. 

Now is the time to have the furnace checked and change the furnace filter. Time for  the last cut of the summer grass.