Sunday, January 20, 2008

Here comes the sun!

Yesterday was supposedly the first day that the sun rose above the horizon, but you certainly wouldn't have been able to prove it around here. Overcast skies and unusually warm temperatures (we're up to 33 degrees above!) delivered shower after shower of fat, wet, sideways snow all day and into the night. The dogigloo photos are now obsolete. With an additional layer of fluffy white stuff blowing at 40 mph, all my hard work has been undone once again.

Sigh.

Since our sunshine is being diffused at present, I'll share a couple of photos from last January around the same time. If you check out the sunlight monitor in the weather information area of the sidebar you'll see that it doesn't hang around for long. But that is quickly changing...daily, in fact. By March, sunglasses will be in vogue again.

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This was our first peek at the sun in January of last year. It wasn't the first day that it had risen above the horizon, but it is the first day we were able to see it. Cloudy skies prevented viewing for almost a week. So, the progress here is more than you'd actually see on the sun's first day back. But it gives you an idea of what we see this time of year.

First Sun 1-25-07

High noon on January 25, 2007. It was a cold, clear day and all the kids wanted to go outside to see the sun. It's an exciting time after a couple of months without rays.

First Sun 2007

15 comments:

Anonymous said...

Well, if it is any consolation to you, it was warmer where you are then it was in Salida, CO. yesterday. They have been having a deepfreeze! I told Keeper that if their reason for moving there was to keep from having THIS mother-in-law move in, then they had succeeded! Brrrrr :)

  said...

Hi, Kimberlee- I just treated myself to looking at all of your photos on flickr. I particularly enjoyed the Autumn Tundra ones, especially the one of the different colored leaves.

Then I went back to your October 1 post and read all of them, and all the comments.

An enjoyable evening.

Thanks!

Kimberlee said...

LOL! I know, Johnny! It's really a weird thing...this burst of warm, moist air in mid-January. It seems like all year long I've had to explain to people that the weather is unusual in one way or another. I don't really know if it's a trend or a blip. I can't imagine that it would stay this warm, but all bets are off at this point. I mean, more than 70 degrees difference in a matter of days! Who knows what's next?

Kimberlee said...

Wow, Lesle! I am amazed AND honored! I'm so glad that you enjoyed the photos and the autumn leaves photo is one of my favorites as well. The tundra can be surprising in the fall. It's not easy to see the colors because everything grows so low to the ground, you have to be pretty much on top of the plants to see them. Thank you for taking so much time with my site. It's great to have you sharing this experience with me!

Anonymous said...

I think I could handle the cold, (ok, the Normal cold up there) but going a couple of months without sunrises or sunsets would be more a challenge for me. One of my favorite times of the day is when I get to go out on the front porch to watch the sunset. I can understand why the kids get so excited!

Anonymous said...

Yeah, Bryan. I do understand the sun thing. It really does bother some people more than others. But it's not actually dark ALL that long and there are always the stars and Northern Lights to look forward to. AND the ambient light that we get on clear days has this whole "mood ring" thing going on. You know, that green/blue/purple melding of a mood ring when you slip in on your finger? Okay, maybe not...you probably didn't have a mood ring when you were growing up, huh? Ask Laurie...I'll bet she'll know what I'm talking about. Anyway, it's really beautiful in its own way. :)

Anonymous said...

Oh yes, I had mood rings, and pet rocks, and Beatles records. :) I think that I would Love the dark side of the year, but until experiencing it, I am hesitant to fully commit to something I have not gone through yet! :)

Anonymous said...

Hi Kimberlee..:). The picture of the first sunrise is very much like the one I took of the last sunrise. I remember standing out there on November 18th (I think) and staring at it for about 30 minutes. I didn't want to miss a second of it, because I knew I wouldn't be seeing it for quite a while. All it was was that tiny little sliver of light. It was right around that time that I woke up in a panic because I had this feeling that a huge (earth-sized!) blanket was falling down on top of us and I couldn't run out from underneath it fast enough!

....Turns out that the whole no sun thing didn't kill me. It only left me with no pigment in my skin. Can a person actually turn gray without dying?

Anonymous said...

You're a wise man, Bryan. :) So...you had a mood ring. Huh. I guess you probably had a Chia Pet too? :)

Anonymous said...

LOL! Interesting perspective, Ami! :) Can a person turn gray without dying? Hmm. I'd have to say yes. Every person who turns gray eventually dies...no question about it. But, it's often a slow process...can take decades, in fact!

I do know what you mean about being pale, though. But just think of all the sun damage you're avoiding! :)

Anonymous said...

Never had the pleasure of a Chia, although they have Chia herb pets now that we've been looking at! :)

  said...

Crow Brings Daylight

Steve said...

January 25, 2008 -- Exactly one year after that last photo, were you able to see the sun today?

Those are great shots, and such important moments in the whole cycle of extremes that you've been teaching us.

Kimberlee said...

Hey, Lesle, that was a neat blog you linked! The raven is a significant figure in the stories of Inupiat culture. I'm not sure if the crow is synonymous with the raven or not. Now you've made me curious! I'll have to check. It's a cool connection with our returning sunlight. Thanks for sharing it!

Anonymous said...

The sun was really gorgeous today, Steve. There was a heavy layer of ice fog most of the afternoon and into the night. That does really cool things with the sunlight. Unfortunately, I didn't have my camera handy at the time.

Along the same lines, I noticed that the moon is very low in the sky tonight and larger than usual and red, red, red. I wonder if the ice fog is responsible for that as well.