Every day I get up, I check the weather models (I’m sure that’s the first thing you do too, right?) to see how the pattern is shaping up. And every day since late January, it’s been the same: cold…with some potential storm (big and small) zipping by with a dose of snow.
It has mystified me how this has held together for so long. Typically, you get a block in the high latitudes and it holds for a few weeks. We’re either cold or warm – or wet or dry in that time period. However, the blocks have come and gone…and we somehow stay cold. The transport of arctic air from Hudson Bay
Certainly the global climate drivers haven’t been helping. In fact, they compound the situation. The Madden-Julian Oscillation has favored cold in the East. Water temperatures in the Gulf of Alaska have been unusually warm for over a year and a half, perhaps favoring the “cold east” situation. Like many things, the sum is greater than its parts, and as all those factors gang up on us, we stay in the cold and the west bakes under sun and drought. Weather patterns are often never one-sided.
So believe me when I say that we’re very fortunate to see a warmup later this week. Added to this, I have a good supply of sun in the next three days. Pure bliss if you’re outside, since the sun will add at least 10 degrees of warmth if you can get away from the breeze – which will be light on Wednesday and brisk tomorrow and Thursday.
Pete