Back On Track

I followed last weekend's High Sierra weather closely. From the distance here in the Inland Valley, it's easier than ever to have telepresence. The internet and webcams are truly amazing ideas.

I kept up with events on the ground and in the sky in order to follow the Red Flag Warnings through to their conclusion. Along the way, the Reno NWS Office issued some Severe Thunderstorm Warnings and Flash Flood Warnings.

Well, the warnings were good ones. Sunday's thunderstorms were vigorous to say the least! By the time the real gully-washers began, the Red Flag Warnings had expired...these were Super-Soakers.

Plenty of rain throughout the Greater Lake Tahoe Area, reported one inch hail in South Lake Tahoe, and an antique railroad derailment were all part of the fun.

Monday morning on the Armstrong and Getty Radio Show, Joe Getty related his experience getting caught with his family aboard, on Lake Tahoe in a 20ft boat when the squall hit. Joe's story was at once harrowing and hilarious. Big hail...quarter-size, Joe said, swells, waves, dark skies, and wind all played a role. I could see them in my mind's eye, huddled under the Bimini top, standing in ankle deep hail, soaked to the bone, shivering in 50F temps that had been up in the mid-70's just minutes before. Joe said the big hail frothed up the lake around them 'till it looked like a pot on a roiling boil.

Things settled down for the rest of the week, thankfully. It's been a cool week here in the Inland Valley, and in the Central Valley as well. Friday's KTVU Noon News did a story on July 2010-the warmest on record, then segued into the weatherdude citing California's cold July! The cold in South America in July was both record breaking and deadly...millions of river-dwelling fish, turtles, and dolphins perished during July's cold snap. The Noon News said Tahoe is warmer than the Bay Area today, and Reno's newspaper touts 100F degrees on tap for this weekend.

A couple other High Sierra News items caught my attention:

A seasonal State Park Employee died from hantavirus in Mono County.

Truckee's local paper updated the latest beetle problems in the High Sierra forests.

By my estimate, this is the third beetle problem I've seen since I moved to the mountains in 1980...in the late 80's, lodgepole pine were under siege from their beetle. Much to my dismay, the mid-90's brought the beetle problem to my favorite White Pines. Now it's Fir Engraver Beetles...more natural cycles.

I really hated to see the White Pines get hit. These are kinda rare in the forest mix. The few that survived the building of the Transcontinental Railroad and the Comstock Lode, were too small for lumber then, and now are huge, stately lords of the forest, so a piece of Living History dies when the huge tree dies.

In other Natural Cycle News...the Sun has been very, very quiet since the little flare-up got solar geeks all fired up last week.

Friday Follies

My post is late today. I stayed up late distracted by politics and baseball. The SF Giants have been playing exciting ball. Since the All Star Break, they've had the best record in the Majors, and their games have that Playoff Atmosphere, and it's only August...good times.

Summer is trying to make an appearance here in the Inland Valley, but isn't exactly roaring back.

I always see the sunny side of these things...it's cooler working in the garden for instance...once I get out there.

Death snuck into my world again this week. A friend's Mom passed away Saturday, and Richie Hayward, drummer and co-founder of Little Feat lost his battle with liver cancer. Richie joins Little Feat co-founder Lowell George in Heaven's Awesome House Band...those guys really cooked!

Little Feat are one of my favorite funky rock n' roll bands of all time. Hands down my favorite Ski Tune is their "Day at the Dog Races" from their 1977 "Time Loves a Hero" album. It's a studio recording of an instrumental that sound like it was recorded live in one take. I used to have the track on my Original Sony Walkman and used it as soundtrack when making a few "Morning Speed Runs" off the top of my mountain...let me clarify...those speed runs were on skis, not in my snowcat...good times.

Fingers' Mom was the first "Cool Mom" I ever knew. I guess they're everywhere today, but for me, Fingers' Mom was the first. Her Memorial Get Together is this afternoon. I always miss these things. I realized this morning why...I manage my life for Sunny Outcomes. I sent Fingers a Remembrance to read as requested:

"Here you go, Fingers...something for your Mom:

Fingers' Mom was the first "Cool Mom" I ever met. They're ubiquitous today, but for me she was the prototype.

Fingers' Mom's easy ways helped us all along our journey into adulthood...not exactly an easy thing to do in those "Turbulent 60's.

Sunday dinners at Fingers' Mom's Downtown apartment were elemental in my journey to become who I am today.

I took home two "Lessons to Live By" thanks to her Sunday dinners. These have served me well to this day. These lessons are part of my DNA now.

One: Always grind your own coffee beans.

Two: Find a different cocktail than the Mai Tai."

Reading that again, I realized I left out the fact that four decades of fine living were made finer by those two lessons...good times.

Weird Weather Wednesday

I was up and at 'em early this morning. Yesterday I dispatched the last bit of old irrigation stuff that's in the way of my Ancestral Diggins digging...so I planned to get an early start and have the lion's share of the heavy lifting done by the time the Sun burned through the marine layer's low overcast and heated things up.

I ground the beans and started the coffee and trundled out to retrieve the newspaper from the driveway...where I was greeted by drizzle! I could see actual raindrop prints on the driveway. It was almost chilly...and the breeze, perfect to give a wind-chill to the proceedings. I demurred...

I grabbed another cup of French Roast, and set about the internet. The AFDs from Reno and SFO/Monterey cited the entrenched Upper Level Trough with it's approaching Short Wave that'll keep things cool until the weekend. SFO/Monterey said the marine layer in up to 2500ft deep.

I killed the pot of coffee and headed out to dig. I wore long pants...it wasn't exactly cold, but the long sweats worked for me. I dug and put together some of the PVC plumbing. I ran out of plumbing fittings...so I watered instead.

The Sun made an appearance...for a minute or two. All across my world temps were down. Sacramento topped out at 77F, well below the average for the day of 93F

Cold was the word of the day. South America enduring record cold, the Atlantic Hurricane Nursery cold, cold, cold, cold.

Well, fire danger wanes when it's cold. They say it's going to warm up for the weekend. These are supposed to be the Dog Days of Summer...jeez, I hope it warms up for the Reno National Championship Air Races in Mid-September!

CorduroyPlanet's Days Off

Here it is already. It's Sunday night August 9th, 2010. Exactly one year has passed since I wrote the first post here. Much to my surprise, this post is the 268th installment of CorduroyPlanet.

Traditionally, these anniversaries are a time of reflection and stock taking...what did I do right, where did I miss...where do I go from here, etc...

That's not what I'm thinking about tonight.

I'm sort of amazed looking back...I can count on one hand the number of times in the past year that I had to cast about to find something to write about. I live a simple life really, work, sleep, family, fun and games, fishing, politics...nothin' special, just work-a-day Dave.

Every one of the 268 times that I've written here, I've resisted writing about the political bees in my bonnet...after all, the internet is filthy with pundits of all stripes, and even I tire of the din easily.

All this started over a three week period one year ago. Here's how it played out. KirkVallus invited me to join Facebook a couple of days after I began CorduroyPlanet. I joined up, followed Facebook's Yellow Brick Road, and heard from lost friends and past employees, colleagues, and acquaintances.

Cap'nDan was the first to post on my wall:

"A blog AND Facebook???? Wow, you're getting a hi-tech!!! Welcome aboard the greatest time suckage known to man."

Cap'nDan's post was dated Sept 2nd, 2009. Cap'nDan is another groomin' human who learned the trade on my mountain. Always good energy, Cap'nDan was a pleasure to work with. He's back East these days, no longer in snow country.

I guess the thing that surprised me the most is how instructive writing daily can be. I wrote more about my day to day than I wrote about grooming, though I did get a good start on "Grooming 101"

I had a few epiphanies along the way, and writing does make one do research...I've expanded my working knowledge of climate systems, space weather, and local forecasting. Extra handy is the Blogger Software that makes keeping track of these posts simple, and going back for review easy.

Oh, and thanks to CorduroyPlanet, now I know what a “Baggy Trough” is.

On the Comeback Trail

This could be one of those "Good News/Bad News" deals.

Since the weather cooled here in the Inland Valley, and the Fire Weather Warnings in the High Sierra ended, I've not paid much attention to the weather out West. I have been following the hurricane forecasts and looking around for some real solid data on the Sun's possible upturn in activity.

Just exactly when will Solar Cycle 24 ramp up?

Lot's of Solar Geeks got all excited this week, when NASA's SOHO Solar Observer Satellite captured sublime images of what's been called a Solar Tsunami. The video shows the Sun's "Perfect Storm"...a twofer even. At last some Space Weather worthy of the title!

An Earth-facing Solar Flare occurs at the same time as a Coronal Mass Ejection (CME) explodes from an area of twisted magnetic fields that have huge filaments of plasma spanning the whole disc of the Sun! There is a visible shockwave that travels from one side of the Sun's disc to the other...your tsunami! Breathtaking stuff, to be sure.

The Sun fired off another M-1 class flare releasing another CME Saturday that will give Earth a glancing blow Monday or Tuesday. Lot's of Space Weather out there...maybe old Sol is awakening at last.

While I was looking at all the space weather stuff, I saw a Tweet announcing a Special Weather Statement for the Greater Lake Tahoe Area:

642 PM PDT SAT AUG 7 2010
...THUNDERSTORMS MOVING FROM EAST TO WEST ACROSS LAKE TAHOE...
AT 636 PM PDT...NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE METEOROLOGISTS WERE TRACKING
STRONG THUNDERSTORMS ALONG A LINE EXTENDING FROM MOUNT ROSE SUMMIT
TO SOUTH LAKE TAHOE...AND MOVING WEST AT 5 MPH.
OCCASIONAL LIGHTNING...MODERATE TO LOCALLY HEAVY RAIN WITH RAINFALL
AMOUNTS UP TO ONE HALF INCH PER HOUR REDUCING VISIBILITY TO LESS
THAN THREE MILES...SMALL PEA OR MARBLE SIZE HAIL...AND GUSTY WINDS
OF AROUND 30 TO 40 MPH... ARE EXPECTED WITH THESE STORMS.
* LOCATIONS AFFECTED INCLUDE...CRYSTAL BAY...DAGGET PASS...GENOA...
GLENBROOK...INCLINE VILLAGE AND KINGSBURY THROUGH 730 PM.
BOATERS AND SWIMMERS ON LAKE TAHOE SHOULD GET OUT OF THE WATER AND
MOVE INDOORS OR INSIDE A VEHICLE NOW. DON`T BE CAUGHT ON THE WATER
IN A THUNDERSTORM. STRONG WIND GUSTS AND LIGHTNING NEAR
THUNDERSTORMS POSE AN IMMEDIATE DANGER TO BOATERS.
IF YOU ARE IN THE PATH OF THESE STORMS...SEEK SHELTER INDOORS AND
STAY AWAY FROM WINDOWS. STAY TUNED TO NOAA ALL HAZARDS RADIO...
WEATHER.GOV/RENO ON THE INTERNET...OR LOCAL MEDIA FOR LATER UPDATES
AND POSSIBLE WARNINGS.

Fine...thankfully, it's wetting rain with that lightning. Fire Weather is back in the Reno AFD!

Wow! 7:34PM, and More Severe Thunderstorm Warnings are up for the Northern regions of the Tahoe Area through Plumas and Lassen Counties. Ride 'em Cowboys!