This phrase could apply to so many things today but I'll try to keep it on the
lighter side and just pick one example that is mostly humorous.
For those of you that do not live in Colorado Springs, it will be difficult for you to understand the humor without a brief history. For those that live in Colorado Springs, please feel free to skip down past the next historical paragraph.
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If you couldn't already tell:
the top of the map is the Western side of Colorado Springs
and the snow-covered area is Pikes Peak
this obviously makes the lower part of the map the Eastern Plains, as I refer to them below. |
Historical Paragraph
Colorado Springs is located right in between the dry, dry, dry Eastern Plains of Colorado and the all-kinds-of-weather-generating Rocky Mountains (centered around Pikes Peak). This particular location creates a very unique weather pattern (or at least it did for several years when I first moved back here after my mission to LA). **The towering mountains create their own cloud systems on the West, while the Albuquerque Low (a pressure system that is almost always "active") generates a Chinook wind (I believe Chinook actually means "sucking wind") on the East. The bottom line is that this unique geographical set-up creates very different weather throughout the day, but it typically follows the same pattern in the late Spring (May) through early Fall (October) months:
- In the morning, the air is damp and temperatures are usually mild,
but the skies are beautifully clear.
- In the Noon hour, clouds begin forming over the Peak and winds begin blowing toward the plains.
- In the early afternoon, the clouds are sucked out over the city and ... it rains.
Maybe I should repeat that with the emphasis it deserves:
it RAINS! HARD! REALLY HARD!
Now the showers torrential downpour only lasts for 30-90 minutes but it has an effect:
- Temperatures drop 10-20 degrees (from the 80's and 90's down to the 60's and 70's ... nice!)
- Trees, grasses, and weeds (boo!) get some needed moisture
- In the evening, the sun is out again in full force and everyone dries out very quickly (this happens in the wintertime too and it is why we never keep snow around here for very long).
**I am NOT a weatherman, but I play one in front of my kids' TV.
So after the "history lesson" here's the application for today's blog.
It doesn't always happen that way. Sometimes we get no clouds and thus no rain ... and so we have to run the sprinkler system (both for the grass but also to cool ourselves down 'cause the wind is a hot wind at 90 degrees). I will accept no comments from the "living-in-humid-places" peanut gallery ... you're not here so don't tell me it's not hot unless you're coming out to visit! That would be nice ...
we'd love to see you! :)
Anyway, when the clouds don't come, those of us who are trying to conserve water have to play chicken with the weather.
Do I run the sprinklers so my grass doesn't die? Or are the clouds just going to come in the night like they sometimes do? It's like the Phineas and Ferb song "Sittin' and Waitin' and Watchin'" ... just wondering if anything is going to happen.
Today ... the
grass looked sad. There were NO clouds on the horizon
at all! The wind was mild. So I ran the sprinklers
for the first time in almost a month! A few hours passed and all of a sudden you could just hear it in the wind. It was too dark to see of course but those lazy clouds had finally formed and decided to grace us with their moisture. I hated those clouds. They mocked me mercilessly. We have a love/hate relationship now but maybe it's my fault for not appreciating them enough this past month. I will just have to try harder.
Keep on rockin' my cloud buddies!
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| A little freaky aren't they?! |
