LibertyBell

March is almost over, this isn't the first week of the month

we're in a rainy pattern though (not surprising for early spring) looks like many more chances for rain and both days next weekend will be rainy.

2020's 3-1 is more what I would expect in a warmer March like this one has been. But 3-1 was actually our warmest day this month, we made it to 67 here.

I bet that's why we get that howling southerly wind as soon as it warms up even a little. It actually felt warmer here because of the lack of wind and I was sitting outside in the full sun this afternoon. I think the wind is blocked here, aside from a few hours this morning, I haven't noticed the tree branches moving.

Yes, you'd think that once it got that warm and stayed consistently warm, it wouldn't be able to get below freezing again. on News 12 they said it was the coldest morning in 3 weeks. Most unwelcome.

Yes it was truly amazing. I don't think we'll see anything like that in our lifetimes again. One of the coldest Februarys ever and colder than most Januarys we have had. It was January 20 to March 20 cold I think without a break and a historic snowfall season to boot (even moreso for Boston and the Cape.)

Yep, I have no objection to how it feels in the afternoon, nice and mild. It's the mornings that are cold (especially if there's wind to make it feel even worse.)

Yes but that record is from almost a century ago lol. We can go by normal temperatures, plus how the month has been going plus it being so late in the season, after the spring equinox. It's interesting 2015 was still so cold, that feels like a different era, that entire winter was much colder than this one.

Thanks for the map, Walt-- it looks like the 0.1 line is almost to Allentown! I hope you've had a wonderful weekend, Walt.

wow I'm glad I haven't seen one of those!

Globes are fun because you're looking at the actual shape of the Earth (more or less). On mine you could actually feel the mountain ranges and it also had the ocean currents listed as well as relief for both the mountains and ocean trenches (and measurements of the biggest ones.) I can't tell you how many dumb kids in my class thought Greenland was bigger than South America because of the ubiquitous Mercator Projection (I liked the Lambert Equal Area Projection myself). They also thought Maine was further north than Minnesota. With a globe it's easy to tell neither is true and are inaccuracies created by trying to show a round Earth on a flat surface.

I did it the old fashioned way, my parents bought me a globe when I was 8 years old and it came with an atlas. I learned all sorts of things from that Rand McNally Atlas and the globe (which was topographically enhanced so you could feel the mountain ranges if you slid your fingertips across it.) Then when I was in 7th grade I got myself a star atlas and learned all the constellations. Those are infinitely more interesting than the countries on a planetary atlas. And this book which I found engrossing-- H. A. Rey's The Stars: A New Way To See Them.

the funny and ironic thing is, when it comes to spring, we're in the northeast. when it's winter, we're in the midatlantic.

Indeed-- I know this is obvious, but temperatures are measured in the shade. It's much warmer in the sun, which is where we should all be.

But there are all these forecasts that show temperatures in the 60s and even 70s starting in early April? Why are there polar opposite forecasts depending on the source?

The sun is so strong that as long as there's no wind, it will feel much warmer than the temperature (which is measured in the shade of course.)

I mean there's no reason for it to get cold since we have no more arctic shots coming. I would have thought that CC would have ended these unusual late season cold shots, but I suppose late March is still vulnerable even though the nights are now shorter than the days.

I loved the game Geography though, we played it a lot in 7th and 8th grade. I remember it was really annoying when we got stuck on the letter A (so in this game you have to name a place that starts with the last letter of the previous place)-- so we would have-- America, Algeria, Andorra, Africa, etc., you get the point, there's a lot of words that both start and end with *A* lol.

I placed 9th so it was okay. I was really nervous so I misspelled the practice round word (very embarrassing!) before the Bee even started. So I was shocked I made it as far as I did.

Thanks-- that's probably why the forecasts were for 8-16 inches. Such a borderline set up. April 1996 was a few degrees colder-- aloft as well as the surface. I remember when the snowstorm started it was 36 after a heavy morning frost low of 28. Amazing that it was that cold on April 9-10, 1996! And it was in the 80s a few days after that.

this reminds me of the summer when JFK gets its hottest weather right after a front passes through

Okay so will this be the last 32 degree low until next fall?

Oh that would have been awesome! I didn't even know there was such a thing. I made it to the National Spelling Bee in 8th grade but lost on a word I had never heard of, *otioseness*. I didn't even have the full list of words, just the first half (A-M). Most were easy to spell phonetically because they were medical words (my mom was a radiation oncologist and I read her books lol.) Otioseness can't be spelled phonetically =\

those tropical ones, OMG I hope those don't come inside, I've seen them on my trips, but they were always outside and look like snakes. I only see maybe one every 2-3 years but when I do, it's usually at night and don't get much sleep that night.

Where do they come from? I don't think we have any caves around here. I had a cricket in my house a few years ago, what's the difference between a regular cricket and a cave cricket?