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El Niño may end up being the saving grace for the current drought situation. The April contiguous U.S. PDSI came in at -7.56 — the lowest April value on record and the 4th lowest monthly value of any month, behind only July 1934, August 1934, and March 2026. So while there was a slight improvement from March’s -7.85, the national drought signal remains historically extreme. The scary counterfactual is: what if this pattern carried into summer and then paired with a 1934-type heat regime — or something even hotter in today’s warmer baseline climate? PDSI is not a linear “temperature gauge,” so I would not casually forecast -10. But entering the warm season already near -8 leaves very little margin. A major summer heat dome, high evaporative demand, and continued precipitation deficits could push national drought severity into territory that is difficult to contextualize historically. In other words: even modest improvement matters here. Without a pattern change, this is the kind of setup you really do not want to stress-test.

Seems to be the norm, doesn’t it?

CFS summer outlook

For the record

Both BOS and PVD with above normal temps in this May 2005 redux

A strong or super Nino ensures there’s lots of mild Pacific air flooding in. But it will also be moist and we won’t have the endless cutters/SWFE we sometimes see in Nina’s. It’ll be southern stream driven and we have to hope to time one or two of them with cold enough air. We all know what happened in Nino seasons like 2002-03, 2009-10, 1982-83, 2015-16 etc. If only 2/6/10 could’ve edged north a little more.

Looking around this area there’s lots of tree damage I assume from the winter storms.

if we get a super nino we'll need to hope for one big bomb 1983 or 2016 style

Great call....

Yeah...don't disagree. I'm tempted to summarize your thoughts here by saying that real intelligence isn't being exceptionally good in a narrow discipline. It's quite intuitive that the "relational database" is perhaps hugely more intelligent than the sophistication in the data tables. Just quick metaphor. Point being the relational aspect stops the over application specific finding..etc But in my discourse here I'm also venturing into the ramification of providing information to those that don't know how to objectively consume it - that's a problem with just giving data out. January 6 is an example of a segments of population gaining access to information, not judging in properly, than working en masse. We could tire of writing specific examples that point out the risks of giving information to basically .... idiots. Lets not mince words. The lovable Idiocracy of civility at large!

I also think we need to recover the polymath instinct. Historically, a lot of important thinkers crossed boundaries between business, politics, science, history, law, and the arts. We’ve moved toward extreme specialization, which has benefits, but also creates blind spots. AI makes it possible for more people to responsibly cross those boundaries again — not by replacing expertise, but by helping them read, calculate, compare, and test assumptions across fields. That’s the spirit of the piece: not “I’m the final authority,” but “let’s make the assumptions visible enough that more people can examine them.”

I think I follow. I agree that access to more data does not automatically produce better analysis — people and institutions can still overread, cherry-pick, or filter evidence through assumptions. But that is exactly why I wanted to start with a narrow, checkable example. I’m not claiming one CET reanalysis settles the whole medieval climate debate. I’m saying Lamb’s specific annual estimate is often treated with more authority than it deserves, and when you test the seasonal assumptions behind it, the result changes substantially. So the point is not “everyone with data is right.” It is almost the opposite: even influential reconstructions should be broken down, tested, and made transparent enough that non-specialists can see where the assumptions enter.

LOL ... yeah, sorry... the other aspect triggered me .. But that doesn't have much analysis. It's a brief homage or outright complaint about taking data in quadrature and perhaps over applying its significance? heh, more in line of what I was talking about, tho. So I launched... Much of my rhetoric and diatribe comes down to a simple sort of reflection. Vast amounts of data and access to information doesn't make someone or an institution necessarily very smart. We live in an era where said vastness is already incomprehensible for lacking the the ability in the audience. And the "institutions" we are creating out of it are not very intelligent, most probably because of that. ( as an aside, a glaring example of one in a few ways in which human innovation has outpaced evolutionary built-in checks and balances; I once mused long ago but still find myself coming back this upon occasions like this conversation - the greatest natural disaster to have ever befallen this planetary history might actually turn out to be the rise of human innovation) I mean I understand the poster's sentiment to have given a broader spectrum of it all upfront, and not after it has passed through a narrow analysis ... or possible bias lens..etc... However, I don't know if that helps. Because there's a bigger problem with humanity whence exposure/consumption of waves of assumptive crushing new information isn't being properly handled. There are evidences abounding as to the ramifications in doing so.

Pattern would be shit with a day here or there of excellent weather but Mt snow in NNE was mentioned and laughed at. We need to break up the persistence trough.

RSMT2 COOP Site, I somehow managed M2.02" for April.

What did you think of the analysis?

I'll do an expanded analysis on Substack at some point. Here's GLERL satellite data for 1995-2025 for all of the lakes.

I wish it was...can we get 3 months of 80s, mostly sunny, and afternoon storms 3 days a week, please? I'm ready for summer.

Played a decent 9 last night. Shot a 40. I was on the 9th green in two but was like 40'-50' away on the wrong tier, putting up a steep slope. Blew my first put 10' past and lipped out the par putt to miss shooting a 39. I hit the ball decently and putted ok with only the one 3 putt. It's a decent start to the season for me.

Well so much for lasting until Fall I’ve been wanting to hold off longer, but my girlfriend had been looking at shelters and came across Izzy and fell in love with her. She was found around a gas company by some employees and had a leg injury. They had paid for the surgery and brought her to the shelter. we went to go meet her last night. Unfortunately, she came down with a cold and because she is being treated we can’t legally take her across state lines. So hopefully we will be able to bring her home Tuesday or the following Tuesday.

Sunday PM to Monday AM is trending to be much wetter than tomorrow's system. We shall see.