South East Qld, the area which Ducky and I both live in was hit by at least 5 tornadoes yesterday. More are predicted today. They've been most active around the area where Ducky (and my father) live. So far just a lot of damage to property. No loss of life. Lots of flooding.

Anyway, more rain today, and another cyclone forming up north. We could be in for a fair bit of wild over the last month of summer by the looks of things.

Stay safe! (and dry!)

No schools! Big wet flakes right now but gonna be ice soon.

rain here. All the snow has melted and it's gun-metal grey outside. It's been nasty for a week and my dog is pissed that I haven't taken her out. She needs some walking but I can't make myself do it in snowing/blowing and temps in the teens. It's warmer now but, you know, rain.

I fucking hate January.

No schools here too. Federal government closed til noon. Freezing rain.

But my firm opened on time, and I was expected to show up on time. Grrr.

Can't blame them though. The roads are fine. icy spots here and there on the sidewalks, but otherwise it was a decent commute.

just switched over to wintry mix here

Wind. Wild wind. Have just placed strategic lamps around the house, ready for lighting ... and we are regrettably short of newspaper for lighting the fire ...

Try doritos

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Od4q...e_gdata_player

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uum2...e_gdata_player

We just got power back on after having none since Sunday arvo. It's Tuesday night here now.

I've never been so happy to have electricity.

But thankfully you're dry, right?
I've been seeing some nasty flood pictures from down there. :(

Yep, high and dry. Well nt so high really, but close enough to the ocean that most of the water runs off, but not close enough to be affected by tidal surges. As a community we should be more worried about ducky. Shes in a much more badly affected area than me. Havent seen her on fb for the last couple of days, so am a bit concerned. I will text her tomorrow if theres still no activity.

Snow is totally gone! Hurrah! No more having to wash Carrot's paws after every little outing. Now just if he comes back muddy.

the last pic I saw Ducks post on FB was of a calm sea with a pink and blue sky. BEFORE that pic she had some pretty wicked looking ones of the sea...

Smirr.

bet that's good for your skin.

Been threatened with rain and high winds since the weekend.
Here in the Vale it's been a bit breezy, and the ground is wet, but nothing to justify stomping to work in my heavy duty boots. Grrrrr.

Trouble is, I've been out after school every day so far, and I have to carry enough stuff to be prepared - hat and cardigan and scarf and flats to wear at work. I look like I'm away for the weekend every morning I leave the house. But the weather is changeable and the temp drops when the sun goes down.

Aside from the boots I will admit the other items have been useful. The school is not uniformly heated and my core temp has dropped enough that I can wear up to three layers on occasion...

I'd like a sharp clean frost. Have decided snow is too messy and muddy. I always suspect dog owners have decided not to pick up the steaming parcels their dogs leave when it is snowing, and therefore have to negotiate any part of pavement with even a hint of brown... even if 99.9% of it is probably mud.

I walked carrotchops through high winds and hail today!

And the winds have been freaking him out at times too. When everything's being blown around outside and the fireplace is acting like a trumpet.

it was 60 (60!) degrees out today but now it's howling, moaning wind with rain/sleet/hail with the rain coming down literally in devlish buckets not a nice soft Scottish rain at ALL- very Dracula weather. And tonight (after this cold front moves in) it is going to SNOW. So from 60 degrees to snow in one 12 hour period.

wild willy wonka weather.


as a joke my sister planted two pink flamingo in my side yard and I fear this roaring hateful wind will blow them away...poor flamingos...

Yeah, pretty big storm too. Looks like this line of thunderstorms stretches from PA to the Gulf of Mexico.

Attachment 42640

Same weather here; temperature's been dropping like a stone all day fom the high 60s to snow tonight. It's been pouring rain with high winds all day. The roads tomorrow morning will be skating rinks.

The high winds combined with the drop in temp usually dries things out.

I think you can declare that a "weather event". Looks kinda scary.

Just thinking about the rain (there's enough coming down to sheet and puddle on the road surfaces) and the rapid temperature drop - it's going to freeze under the snow. Hereabouts, they don't send the plows and salt trucks out until after the snow completely stops.

Why waste money when the snow's still coming down, is the thinking.
Amateurs. :rolleyes:

It won't get that cold here, but in the last 20 minutes, it's gone from 68 down to 58, and it's still falling.

we've a new thing here in Dayton where they pre-salt the roads BEFORE the snow/ice with salt and this new thing that they have which is cheaper and works better--some agricultural thing; in twenty years we'll find out it causes brain cancer but so far the roads aren't too bad.

Howling winds, my windows are shaking, my front door is rattling. Wolf wants in!

We survived the night just fine, and now it's a blustery day with the sun poking out from behind the clouds. I love this kind of weather. The wind is strong but not damaging, and the clouds are racing across the sky with a strong sunlight shining through every once and a while.

It's a vibrant day. There's electricity in the air. When I was a kid, this kind of weather would make me just tear around the playground.

My car was pushed all over the interstate this morning. Seriously high winds. The roads were OK though.

You were right - no skating rinks. A little ice but nothing horrible. I need to remember that there are plenty of places in the US that equal Canada for snow experience and general lousy winter weather! :blush:

In fact, anyone from southern Ontario has nothing to say about snow. They shut down Toronto and Hamilton for an inch of the stuff. You have to get north of Toronto to get into the snow belts.

When my sister moved to VA from NY she called to tell me that she was driving to work and the snow had just barely begun to fall, just a few flakes barely sticking, and people were skidding into ditches, abandoning their cars and walking. She didn't realize that not everyone knew how to drive in snow.

20 years later and she still shakes her head at southerners in snow.

Ha! Trilby at the end of summer I buy pink flamingo sets for about 4 bucks for next years yard plantings ;)

Rain!! !@#$%^ rain. Since Sunday

38 more days Noah!

Yer gonna need a bigger boat.

Snow's a-comin'.

Chicago is just getting it now.

Drought Season
 

Sounds bad and the maps look worse.

A 1930s drought was severe. But made devastating by mismanagement done by man. Facts explained in Ken Burn's PBS documentary: The Dust Bowl

Essential to averting disaster is science. Science to predict a disaster before it happens. And science to change mistakes so that a drought does not become a disaster.

Long ago, the informed had discussed a problem with a drying aquifer, too much unproductive farm land, and other problems on land that is now at environmental risk. One rather respected solution was to buy out many farmers. Convert acres of land back into prairie grass reserves. To protect or refresh ground water. To let soils recover from heavy farming. To protect rivers from top soil runoff. To diminish flooding (as now expected in the Dakotas). And a long list of other potential solutions.

But let's remember who was running our government then. Wacko extremists who even invented a mythical Saddam, destroyed the American economy, all but protected bin Laden, and uselessly massacred almost 5000 American servicemen. With leaders like that, then doing better science was all but impossible.

An array of satellites necessary for that science were canceled or quashed in proposal by an administration that hates science. One example was a satellite that wackos called GoreSat. Due to extremist hate of science, reality, and Democrats. Making victims or creating bogeymen is how extremists maintain power.

As described in Bush's Shrinking Safety Zone: The irony: farmers today are doing well due to welfare from corn ethanol and crop insurance. Farm land prices are at all time high. Some layman only assumed drought means agricultural failure. Others who learn from recent history know otherwise. A drought does not automatically create agricultural failures or bankruptcies.

However, when farming was so prosperous and land prices so high (during a previous dry period), too many business school types ignored long term thinking. Resulting in severe agriculture downturns years later.

You cannot assume a drought and bad crops result in agricultural hardships. But we know one fact from so many previous droughts (including the 1930 Dust Bowl and the Ethiopian famine). Most of the problems are created by human mismanagement - not by the drought. Therefore we need more environmental science necessary for any long term agricultural planning. Not less as still advocated by George Jr's wackos and their legacy the tea party.

Space from Earth only discusses one example of the problem. Names include Aqua, Aura, Terra, and POES. But research into avoiding environmental disasters was subverted by George Jr. After all, it might discover who is really creating global warming. Wacko extremists today are continuing that effort by subverting new science in the name of their political fears, propaganda, and cost controls. Even advocate welfare to agriculture - ie corn ethanol. You would think they learn from the 2008 world wide food shortage. But they said they wanted America to fail.

Two recent examples were demonstrated by a near zero hurricane Sandy and by another serious low pressure system that followed three months later. Having been starved of funds, then American weather models did not accurately predict accordingly. More accurate on both storms were European weather models. Why did Europeans do better weather forecasting? Their governments and science are not subverted by wacko extremists who fear research into anything (including gun violence) and who prefer to enrich the rich. The European supercomputer was even better. Extremist legacy remains in numerous science tools (ie satellites, computer models, etc) that cannot happen in America.

Found a new and interesting site for weather, http://forecast.io
Enter your address in the header bar, then click on local and click on the image. It will give you a very detailed forecast for the next four hours. It will show if it's a passing shower or you should move the whole picnic indoors.
On the right is the next hour, 24 hours, and week.

Doesn't fly for me? Try again later.

I saw that dust bowl doco over the last month. What a spectacular example of shitting in your own nest. Back then, at least some people could genuinely claim ignorance as an excuse. But, we're still led by short term decision making in a world with medium term variability.

I saw it too. It was so fascinating.

In the middle of a cracking storm right now.
I mean an English storm, not one of the foreign ones that are spectacular and/or kill people.

Both cats are inside, so it's a cosy feeling.
The 'rents have to get back from Mass, but they can always get a taxi or shelter in the pub (their new routine is to have supper there on the way home.)
Haven't had a daylight weekend storm for ages.

I might just go doze to the sound of thunder for a while.
It's to the South so I'll only see reflected lightning.

We've had the warmest summer on record, and it's still going. There has been a bushfire in the Adelaide Hills, out of control for the last three days, in MAY. We've finally got a few showers of rain, which is helping.

I've long since given up on there being a "normal". Times they are a-changin', we'll just have to hope, and wait and see.

I did not know such things happened. :3_eyes:
... after the ubiquitous 30-second ad. :eyebrow:

A "wave" of ice slowly comes on shore from Mille Lacs Lake area of Minnesota. (USA Today - May 12)

Years ago, George Jr supporters reported that Global Cooling was ongoing. What they say is never supported by numbers. Therefore it must be true.

it was 80 degrees last week. HOT. sunny, clear, HOT.

Today, thundershowers, 60 degrees, hail. yeesh. this is why I left Oklahoma.

Freeze warning last night, 39 this morning when I got up, it will be 85 tomorrow.

Temperature fluctuations. We has them.

Hot flushes?

that's whatcha get after indian or mexican dinners, yah?

If you're still interested in Fire Tornados, the full report is now online, here:

http://www.abc.net.au/catalyst/stories/3774941.htm

From the Transcript:

Your homeland is trying to kill you.

That was worth watching btw.

I think the really important bit is the bit about high winds over lee facing slopes creating mountain waves, causing deep flaming and lateral spreading along the ridge-line. That is the sort of thing that will happen fairly often, and we need to understand it.

The fire tornado itself is scary as heck and very spectacular, but such things are very rare. I hope.

The high today is to be only 80F. No humidity. It's beautiful!! Baby and I are headed to the river, gonna grab some hotdogs & buns, some beer, build a fire on the riverbank, and enjoy the sun, the river, the woods, and each other.

When you get a July day like this in KY, you STFU and take it. See ya, suckers.

This is gonna be a great day.:cheerldr:

Your soundtrack for today:




Sometimes you're golden, man.

That chick trying to hula that hoop, has all the moves of a cornstalk. :lol2:

state wide burn ban instituted today.

two large fires burning east of here.

today is cool, under seventy for the predicted high, and a measurable amount of rain for tomorrow, but no lifting of the burn ban until the end of september.

PDX is pink this evening...

Around 7 pm, a thunderstorm traveled across the peak of Mt Hood,
and on NE across the Columbia River. Lots of lightning.

FWIW, there is a rainbow in this pic... it's just one of those invisible kind.

If a rainbow cannot be seen by a camera, does it make a noise?

Rainbows have to be very vivid to photograph. And even then, they don't look particularly good.
Attachment 45116

july was hot and dry. no daytime highs less than 70 deg F and none higher than 90 deg F, zero precipitation. it's crispy.

Here in KY, we got off soooo lucky for July. I don't think it broke 90 degrees the whole month. In fact, I don't think we've broken 90 except for the first week of June. August has been just lovely, a little damp, but lovely. My hayfever is a little snottier/eye-boogerier than usual, I guess the ragweed is doing well what with all the rain...I'll happily suffer for 80s in August.

BTW, our first week of August was in the mid-70s!