One of the things I love about living in the Pacific Northwest is the temperate weather. I can usually make it through Winter with a fleece and a raincoat.Summers are usually not too hot. You’d think there wouldn’t be anything for me to obsess about, and yet, I obsess over two things.
In the summer, when the weather is generally perfect, we get an occasional heat wave. When that happens, I check the two websites I have bookmarked. My favorite thing to do on these days is to go to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration website.
It has a lovely little link on the right hand side called “3 Day History”, which gives you the temperature EVERY HOUR for the last three days. During a heat wave I can compare the hourly temperature from one day to the next and compare how quickly each day is heating. I might think “Oh, it is heating more quickly today than yesterday. I should take Lucy for a walk earlier.” I can also look ahead to see how soon the heat wave will break and pace myself.
In winter, I tend to use a local TV station’s website to track rainfall. I love the fact that they not only track how much rain has fallen in day, but also in a onto and in a year AND they compare it to the average.
Is it normal to care this much that we are currently 13.34 inches above average in they rainfall year?
I also track rainfall on my drive home. As I cross the Willamette River on the Marquam Bridge, I take my eyes off the road and look at the water level.
I use two landmarks to help me determine how high (in winter) or low (in summer) the Willamettte is. First, I look to a little beach area next to a marina.
In high water the beach is gone and it has been absent most of March. I put my eyes back on the road. Next, I take a moment to look at the Hawthorne Bridge, which connects to land on the West side of the Willamette, just south of the little beach.
The bridge’s concrete supports have water level markings and I have to dart my eyes back and forth between the road and the bridge a few times to determine how high (or low) the water is.
Just for the record, at the time of writing this, rain is forecast through Tuesday. Wednesday will be a transition day and it will start warming up on Thursday. Spring Break begins on Friday afternoon, so I am hoping we might have a little sunshine while I enjoy my staycation.
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