Weather!

[bystander]

Wimp!

That's me, weakly interacting massive person.

[Chris Peterson]

Wimp!

That's me, weakly interacting massive person.

Formerly MACHO, perhaps?

[Ann]

Wimp!

That's me, weakly interacting massive person.

Formerly MACHO, perhaps?

Massive compact halo object?

Ann

[bystander]

Formerly MACHO, perhaps?

Nah, I was never macho. I've never been that aggressive.
However, I never really liked being the center of attention.

[orin stepanek]

House temperature has fallen into the 60s, which isn't bad when you are active or sleeping, but a little cool for being lazy and doing nothing. I'm resisting turning on the heat in the house, but if the inside temps fall much more, I may be forced.

We had a freeze overnight; but the house temp is still 72. No need for the furnace yet!

[neufer]

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Click to view full size image 1 or image 2

<<A series of tropical storms and heavy monsoon rains combined to make 2011 the worst flood season on the lower Mekong River since 2000. Floods swept across Cambodia, impacting 17 of the country’s 24 provinces. As of October 18, at least 207 people have died in the floods and 34,000 families have been evacuated, said the Cambodian Red Cross.

These images compare seasonal flooding along the Mekong River and the Tonle Sap (Tônlé Sab) on October 18, 2011, and October 26, 2006. Taken by the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on the Aqua and Terra satellites, the images include both infrared and visible light to increase the contrast between water and land. Water is black or dark blue, while the surrounding plant-covered land is green. Clouds are pale blue and white. Both the Tonle Sap and the Sen River flood Kompong Thom, one of the most severely impacted provinces in Cambodia. The Mekong River is also swollen in 2011 compared to 2006.

Devastating though the flood is, Southeast Asia revolves around the Mekong’s seasonal floods. Eighty to ninety percent of the river’s flow occurs during the flood season, which runs from June to November. This flush of water creates wetland habitats and draws nutrients from land into the river to feed a diverse fish population. The floods can damage crops, but they also lay down nutrient-rich soil that naturally fertilizes fields. The Mekong River Commission estimates that the annual flood causes 60 to 70 million dollars in damage, but brings 8 to 10 billion dollars into the economies of Southeast Asia.

Strangest of all, perhaps, is the flood’s influence on the Tonle Sap, Southeast Asia’s largest freshwater lake. For part of the year, the lake drains into the Mekong River, but during the flood season, the Mekong pushes water back into the lake. Water flows into the wetlands between the Mekong and the Tonle Sap and builds up in the lake itself. In October 2011, water levels on the Tonle Sap were above flood status—a level they last reached in 2000.>>

[Beyond]

What a forecast for Connecticut tonight. Rain, scattered freezing and slushy snow. Brrr, Blah, Yuck!

[neptunium]

Just a few days ago we had temps in the eighties and now we have a cold front moving through, bringing rain, some lightning, and gusty winds. The temperature has dropped about thirty degrees now. Luckily, it is supposed to be sunny all week.

[Beyond]

The first snowfall of the year! YEE-HAA!! Er, um, Thinking about last winter i mean, boooo go away, shoo, scram!

[orin stepanek]

It froze last night! Ugh! Cold in the house; the pilot light went out! Had to get down and relight it. Ahh! House nice and cozy now.

[Ann]

It's been foggy here for a few days now. No blue sky to be seen, and no stars, either! (Neither our own nor those which are light-years away.)

Ann

[neufer]

Dramatic 400 mb (jet stream) water vapor map (Oct. 29)

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The first snowfall of the year! YEE-HAA!! Er, um, Thinking about last winter i mean, boooo go away, shoo, scram!

[Beyond]

Dramatic 400 mb (jet stream) water vapor map (Oct. 29)

What's so Dramatic It looks like The Joker's mouth is about to give us a kiss of winter It may be early, but Dramatic , NO.

[neufer]

Undramatic 400 mb (jet stream) water vapor map (Oct. 28)

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.

Dramatic 400 mb (jet stream) water vapor map (Oct. 29)

What's so Dramatic It looks like The Joker's mouth
is about to give us a kiss of winter
It may be early, but Dramatic , NO.

• Dramatic as compared to 24 hours ago

[Beyond]

24 hours ago, he was just starting to practise his 'puckering'.

[Beyond]

oooh, good layer of slush on the road. I have some straws and 16oz cups. Anyone got any flavoring

[owlice]

It.is.snowing. In October. That is just.... just.... well, it's not allowed! How dare it!

October!

What nerve!

(Not sticking here; was sticking north of here, however, and of course, that's where I was for a good part of the day. Measurable, shovelable, covering-the-street treacherous-driving snow. Car shimmied once. Made me slow down, that's for sure!))

[Beyond]

I lost power a little after six pm. My back-up kicked in for my pellet stove and i was comfy for the next 3-hours. Then my inverter quit!! So after a little time and a few assorted words, i donned my winter gear, as it was down to 65' F inside already. But then i moved around a bit and started to sweat. So i figured I'd just go sleep in the chair. I was just getting to sleep, when all of a sudden there was a bright light. YEA!! The powers back! Then there were a few 'blinks' of the lights. I hope it doesn't go out again. At least not till the place warms up. For 5 years my backup has just been sitting there not doing much of anything. Then when i need it, it only lasts 3-hours. Darn thing cost me $1000 with two very big batteries. Now I'll have to get it fixed, one-of-these-days.

[neptunium]

It.is.snowing. In October. That is just.... just.... well, it's not allowed! How dare it!

October!

WHAT?! It has broken all known laws of the weather! It should never snow in OCTOBER!

[owlice]

WHAT?! It has broken all known laws of the weather! It should never snow in OCTOBER!

Well, maybe it should in other places, but here? That just isn't done!

Beyond, I hope you keep power and stay toasty warm!

[Beyond]

Thanks, owlice. If not, I'll just become a Beyondsicle

[neptunium]

Good point, owlice, although I think that since you're close to the Appalachian mountains, there would be a better chance of snow there. However, if it snows in the plains now, the laws of weather will be broken!

[neufer]

[b][color=#008000]Great Green Glob of ozone descends over Northern Hemisphere[/color][/b]

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Cruel Trick of Weather Sows Havoc
By ANNE BARNARD and SARAH MASLIN NIR
New York Times: October 30, 2011

<<By the time the great snowstorm of October 2011 finally ended early Sunday, more than three million customers would find themselves without power and with the prospect of enduring several more days without it. In many communities, the storm had a far greater impact on daily life than Tropical Storm Irene. People emptied stores of generators and chain saws and flocked to town halls to charge phones on emergency power. The chilled and the hungry drove miles looking for a cup of coffee, or barbecued meat inexorably defrosting in powerless freezers. In Worcester, Mass., a wedding with cranberry dresses and flowers the colors of fall foliage ended up soggy and white. In Glen Rock, N.J., orderly suburban blocks became a maze, with fallen branches draped across nearly every street.

At least nine deaths had been attributed to the storm, including a 20-year-old man electrocuted by a downed power line in Springfield, Mass. Communities in New Jersey, Connecticut, Massachusetts and New Hampshire expected schools to remain closed for several days as they cleaned up downed electrical wires and fallen branches. And in Central Park, as many as 1,000 trees may be lost — eight times the damage suffered after Tropical Storm Irene. But the most telling sign of how the snow had turned seasons topsy-turvy — throwing an icy and sometimes lethal blanket over trees whose leaves were often still green — the storm threatened to obliterate Halloween.

In Hollis, N.H., officials held an urgent meeting at the town hall where, unlike at their homes, there was heat, hot water and flushing toilets. The emergency management director, Don McCoy, gave them the bad news: He was canceling Halloween until next year. It was too dangerous, he said, for children to meander through total darkness, live wires and fallen branches, and there was no way to know how soon it would be safe. Later, he relented, declaring trick-or-treating merely postponed, until Nov. 5, following the lead of the nearby town of Brookline. “Things should be a little better then, and we hate to disappoint all the kiddies who went out and bought costumes,” Mr. McCoy said.

In Worcester, Mass, officials asked people not to trick or treat until Thursday; in New Canaan, Conn., a Halloween parade was canceled; and in New Jersey, town governments issued 5 p.m. curfews — effectively banning trick-or-treating — by sending text messages to residents on their phones. “I told my kids we’re not having a white Christmas, we’re having a white Halloween,” said Maria Ponce, 32, of Port Chester, N.Y.. “They’ll have to wear boots to trick-or-treat.” In New York City, though the storm was less severe, the threat to Halloween reared its head on Saturday during early Halloween events, as children cast off bumblebee antennae in favor of warm hats and hid superhero outfits under coats.

The storm swept harder across parts of Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Massachusetts, upstate New York, New Hampshire, Connecticut, Rhode Island and Maine, setting records in some places both for snowfall and power failures. Plainfield, Mass., received 30.8 inches of snow, West Milford, N.J., got 31.4, and Jaffrey, N.H., saw 31.4, according to the National Weather Service. More than 12 inches fell at Bradley International Airport in Windsor Locks, Conn. The previous record for the day was less than a tenth of an inch, in 2000, the weather service said. Governors in New Jersey, Massachusetts and Connecticut declared states of emergency. Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo of New York declared an emergency in 13 counties. According to state governments and utilities, at least 2.3 million people lost power. More than 400,000 customers lost power across New York State at the storm’s peak, and most remained without electricity at midday Sunday, with the greatest damage in Westchester, Putnam, Rockland and Orange counties. Power failures hit 650,000 people in Massachusetts, 10,000 in Rhode Island, 280,000 in New Hampshire, and 350,000 in New Jersey, down to 271,000 by Sunday afternoon. Gov. Dannel P. Malloy of Connecticut said more than 750,000 homes in the state were without power, breaking a record set in August when the remnants of the tropical storm passed through. People trudging through stores in search of sold-out supplies had little time to meditate on climate change. They talked more about how recent storms — the ice storm of 2008 in New Hampshire and Tropical Storm Irene in New Jersey — had prompted them to buy generators and left them better prepared.

But scholars began marshaling their arguments to remind people that single storms, no matter how dramatic, say little about overall climate patterns. Robert Stavin, an economist at Harvard’s John F. Kennedy School of Government, said a surprise winter storm no more disproves climate change than a hot day in August proves it. But larger patterns of extreme storms and precipitation, even if accompanied by cold snaps, support the theory of global warming, he and several climate researchers said, since warming oceans are sending more moisture into the air.

The storm may be a death knell for apple picking season at Hager Brothers’ small orchard in Shelburne Falls, Mass. With temperatures expected in the teens, “that’ll probably be the end of what we can pick off our trees,” said Bethany Miles, who was working at the orchard store.

The wedding of Christine and Ryan Hubbard on Saturday night in Worcester, Mass. — with pumpkins and flowers in warm, deep colors — was aiming for a crisp autumn look but ended up with an aesthetic that was more frigid slush. “If somebody looks at our wedding pictures, they’re going to think that we got married in December,” Ms. Hubbard said.

To the north, the lights went out on Saturday night as Ryan Thibeault of Hollis, N.H., blew out the 16 candles on his birthday cake. Ryan’s mother, Pauline, found mittens for the partygoers, and everyone made do, figuring the darkness made for a seasonally spooky setting. “We sat in the hall in the dark laughing and ate cold pizza by candlelight,” she said. She was less amused on Sunday morning, when, bundled up in a parka, she trekked 25 yards through the snow to a lake to fill a bucket. The water was needed to flush the toilets.

More threatening were downed wires and precariously hanging branches. In Sherman, Conn., Jerry Ryan, a lead electrician for Connecticut Light and Power, was working to restore a transmitter damaged by a tree, using a hand-held voltage detector that lights up if a wire is live. “The whole town of Sherman is shut down,” he said. “This beats out Hurricane Irene big time. It’s 10 times worse.”

Kathy Johansen, working at Woodbury Pewter in Woodbury, Conn., said she had a scare when she was stuck in the snow. Just as a passing snowplow driver was scooping out an escape route, a giant tree crashed within inches of her car. “I would have been crushed completely,” she said. “And you’ll never guess the name of the road: Transylvania Road. Happy freakin’ Halloween.”>>

[neufer]

[b][color=#008000]Great Green Glob of ozone descends over Northern Hemisphere[/color][/b]

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<<An unseasonably early nor’easter dropped as much as 32 inches (81 centimeters) of snow on some parts of the northeastern United States in late October 2011. Nicknamed “Snowtober,” the storm left wet, heavy snow on trees still loaded with leaves. News reports described snapped branches, snapped power lines, and utility companies scrambling to restore lights and heat.

The Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on NASA’s Terra satellite captured this natural-color image on October 30, 2011. A swath of snow sweeps from West Virginia northeastward to Maine. Clouds hover east and west of the snow, blocking the satellite sensor’s view of western Pennsylvania and parts of the Atlantic Ocean.

The storm broke snowfall-total records in cities throughout the U.S. Northeast, Capital Weather Gang reported. The nor’easter was also surprisingly intense, causing wind gusts along the Massachusetts coastline of 69 miles (111 kilometers) per hour.

More than 3 million homes and businesses lacked electricity in the wake of the storm, according to news reports. Capital Weather Gang reported that this storm caused a record loss of electricity in Connecticut—worse than the power loss caused by Hurricane Irene. As residents headed back to work on October 31, closed or icy roads complicated commutes in multiple states. Fortunately, rising temperatures were expected to help melt the snow.>>

[orin stepanek]

I lost power a little after six pm. My back-up kicked in for my pellet stove and i was comfy for the next 3-hours. Then my inverter quit!! So after a little time and a few assorted words, i donned my winter gear, as it was down to 65' F inside already. But then i moved around a bit and started to sweat. So i figured I'd just go sleep in the chair. I was just getting to sleep, when all of a sudden there was a bright light. YEA!! The powers back! Then there were a few 'blinks' of the lights. I hope it doesn't go out again. At least not till the place warms up. For 5 years my backup has just been sitting there not doing much of anything. Then when i need it, it only lasts 3-hours. Darn thing cost me $1000 with two very big batteries. Now I'll have to get it fixed, one-of-these-days.

Hope you still got power! A Lot of people went without and I;n not sure if all was restored yet.