Good morning! Happy Thursday. Some pretty heavy rain and 53 degrees in Cicero, NY. There is a north-northwest breeze at 6 mph. The dew point is 52 degrees. A very wet day, although the rain will fade out later, and it will just be damp and cloudy. The skies will clear tomorrow around noontime. I sure hope this pattern doesn’t last for all of November, as it would be darn depressing for camping and my road trip come next week. I plan to leave a week from Friday (Veterans Day) and return the Sunday before Thanksgiving.

Continued showers through the morning, then just clouds and dampness later. High of 54 degrees at 1pm. One degrees above normal. Maximum dew point of 51 at 9am. Northwest wind 6 to 10 mph. Chance of precipitation is 100%. New precipitation amounts between a quarter and half of an inch possible. Last year, mostly sunny with a high around 72. I wish we had weather like that today. The record high of 75 was set in 1990. There was 0.9 inches of snow back in 1951, back when Averill Harriman was the governor and the man from Missouri was President.

The sun will set at 5:52 pm with dusk around 6:22 pm, which is 1 minutes and 16 seconds earlier than yesterday. Daylight Savings Time ends on Sunday morning at 2:59 AM when our clocks automatically flip back an hour, except for the clock in Big Red.  Today will have 10 hours and 8 minutes of daylight, a decrease of 2 minutes and 33 seconds over yesterday.

Tonight will have a chance of showers, mainly between 8pm and 5am. Low of 42 degrees at 5am. Six degrees above normal. West wind 7 to 9 mph. Chance of precipitation is 40%. New precipitation amounts of less than a tenth of an inch possible. One year ago, clear with a low around 40. The record low of 17 occurred back in 1951.

There are 3 weeks until Thanksgiving when the sun will be setting at 4:33 pm with dusk at 5:04 pm (Standard Time). The average high temperature is 44 degrees, with a record high of 70 in 2014.

There are 4 days, 12 hours and 16 minutes until the polls close in NY State on Election Day. At this point, I am pretty indifferent about the presidential election. I voted for Jill Stein, and I honestly don’t care if Donald Trump or Hillary Clinton wins. Both of them will make our lives miserable.

I don’t understand why some of my friends get all excited about the Presidential race. I would be absolutely fine with Trump winning. I think he would be a good safe guard on the second amendment. I also think he would have a more balanced approach to the environment and be less antagonistic towards the people who use our public lands. On the other hand, I think Clinton would be better on the economy and foreign relations. There are many things I like about Trump, and other things I like about Clinton. Time is going by so quickly at this point, but I’m glad it will be soon over. And then I’ll be in the woods, hopefully not sitting under a tarp, freezing off my ass, listening to the NPR’s postmortems on the election on my waterproof bluetooth speaker. But hopefully not snow.

Since I got the new brakes on my truck, I’m impressed how smoothly it stops. Actually, it’s a bit disconcerting to apply the brakes and feel nothing at all as the peddle is depressed — besides the vehicle slowing. I guess the rotators were pretty warped, but I hadn’t noticed because it was gradual. Even in the rain this morning, the truck stopped very smoothly. It used to be kind of bad with the rain.

Back in 1957, The Soviet Union launches Sputnik 2. On board is the first animal to enter orbit, a dog named Laika. He had no plan for return, and gave his life on the mission, but he did survive living in outer space for several hours, showing that human life could be sustained up there.

Today, three years later in 1960, the Great Swamp National Wildlife Refuge was established by an Act of Congress after a year-long legal battle that pitted local residents against Port Authority of New York and New Jersey officials wishing to turn the Great Swamp into a major regional airport for jet aircraft.

Good morning! Sixty days from now it will be New Years Day 2017. Where does the time go by so quickly? In the mean time, it is a rather depressing November morning. Cloudy and 56 degrees in Cicero, NY. Calm wind. The dew point is 52 degrees. The skies will clear Friday around 6 am.

Today will have a slight chance of showers after 3pm. Otherwise pretty cloudy and gray November day. High of 62 degrees at 2pm. Nine degrees above normal. Maximum dew point of 56 at 2pm. Calm wind. Chance of precipitation is 20%. Last year, partly sunny with a high around 63. The record high of 82 was set in 1950. There was 0.1 inches of snow back in 1911.

Got the new brakes, rotators, and tires rotated. I had them also flush and replace the brake fluid, which after 5 years most certainly was contaminated with water (and is recommended by manual to be changed). Water tends to corrode all the brake components and also increases stopping distance. I probably should have done that sooner, but the brakes have lasted a lot longer for me then many people. The brakes seem to stop better, but I don’t use them that much, but I wanted to make sure things were working well before vacation. It wasn’t cheap, but with my big truck, nothing is ever cheap. I could of waited longer, but I didn’t want to risk trouble later on.

Still need to work out my vacation plans. I think I will stop over at least one night at the Finger Lakes National Forest and the Allegheny National Forest, but I also want to spend a lot of time this year in Allegany, Cattaragaus, and Chautauqua counties in the Southern Tier. There are a lot of state forests and lands I want to explore in this remote part of state. Probably some truck cap camping and some tent camping, depending on where I am and the weather. If I do Canaseraga/Ossian State Forest, it will be tent camping. But with the lantern and the heater, and the portable bluetooth speaker I’ll have audio. Some will depend on the weather.

The sun will set at 5:53 pm with dusk around 6:23 pm, which is 1 minutes and 17 seconds earlier than yesterday. Today will have 10 hours and 11 minutes of daylight, a decrease of 2 minutes and 34 seconds over yesterday.

Tonight will have a slight chance of showers before 9pm, then rain likely, mainly after 3am. Low of 53 degrees at 4am. 17 degrees above normal. Maximum dew point of 55 at 6pm. Light and variable wind. Chance of precipitation is 60%. New precipitation amounts between a tenth and quarter of an inch possible. One year ago, mostly clear with a low around 36. The record low of 20 occurred back in 1980.

There are 4 weeks until First Day with Temperatures Recorded Below Zero when the sun will be setting at 4:30 pm with dusk at 5:02 pm (Standard Time). The average high temperature is 42 degrees, with a record high of 67 in 1933.

Today is the earliest day of the year that Election Day can fall, as it always has to be the first Tuesday after the first Monday in November. Needless to say, the first Tuesday of November this year was November 1st, so we don’t have Election Day until November 8th. There are 5 days, 10 hours and 52 minutes until the polls close in NY State on Election Day.

Forty years ago today, Jimmy Carter was elected president. Before my time. The peanut farmer, he was the first and only president from the deep south, unless you consider the Ozark-country Governor of Arkansas was who was elected in 1992.

Good morning! Today is a nice start to November. Partly sunny and 39 degrees in Cicero, NY. There is a east-southeast breeze at 7 mph. Hopefully this weather will last, but alas November is the cloudiest month of the year in Upstate New York, and a lot of cloudy days are ahead on the calendar. Rain is quite likely for the weekend with lots of clouds. The good news is it’s not snow.

Today is going to mostly sunny with a high of 59 degrees at 3pm. Five degrees above normal. Maximum dew point of 43 at 5pm. South wind 7 to 13 mph. Last year, mostly cloudy with a high around 62. The record high of 78 was set in 1950. There was 3.9 inches of snow back in 1951.

Dropped Big Red off to have new brakes put on and tires rotated. I was on the fence about the brakes, but I wanted them done before I go on vacation next week. They had some life left on them, but as the shop noted and visual inspection also concluded, the pads are almost down to the wear indicators. While I’m in North Syracuse, I’d rather have my truck worked on rather then breaking down on vacation due to worn brakes.

I’ve waited too long on the brakes  in the past, and then it gets a lot more expensive. Brakes really are a simple job, and while they’ll charge an arm and leg to do it, I’d rather just leave the experts do it rather then bugger up the  bolts or break hardware. A shop can do it while I work, or I can I can waste a morning in the cold freeing up stuck bolts, and possibly messing up the brakes. I’ve wrecked many a vacation trip with brake worries or problems.

I’ll top off the oil and windshield washer fluid and should be ready for vacation. I’m thinking Western NY and Pennsylvania this year. I was going to go to West Virgina and Blue Ridge Parkway, but it seems like most of the campgrounds are closed this time of year down that way, and the days are so darn short. I have a list of some little known state forests I think I want to visit in Western NY this year. I have my New York hunting license, so I might put it use while I’m out there. All the equipment should be working well on my truck including the batteries and electric, and it should be a good trip. I will bring the Big Buddy Heater to keep warm, especially around the fire. I am looking forward to getting out.

Thinking that Black Friday is only three weeks from Friday, and my old laptop is chugging along quite well now that I have access to my files. That way I can get the Christmas specials. I’m still really liking that Lenovo Ideapad R14 I saw at the store but with the SSD drive for $620 that Staples had on sale last week. The touch screen and tablet mode would be ideal for making up maps. I love the 1920×1080 resolution too — it just gives a lot more room for map making on screen with all the toolbars I use. But I ain’t paying the $750-800 for it when it recently was on sale for much less.

I haven’t set up the new version of QGIS on my old laptop, but I have enough maps in reserve on my blog that I don’t really need to make up ones. I guess I could install QGIS so I could make up some Google Maps in particular. I’ll be on vacation through the start of deer season, which this falls the weekend before Thanksgiving — so I won’t really need a laptop. Southern Zone deer season is early compared to Election Day but that’s because Election Day is late, and Thanksgiving is early because December 1st is a Thursday.

I drove to the sketchy North Syracuse Chinese Restaurant in my jacked up pickup truck last night. The food was sketchy. But I tried it. I’ve been wondering for a long time if it was as bad as it looked. It is. Overpriced too. I actually liked the Chinese food I got in Canastota. That place was more sketchy than North Syracuse. You never know what hick town Chinese places are like until you try them. Hick towns can be fun places.

As we head into November, days are rapidly getting shorter. The sunset is earlier, but it will be much earlier come next Sunday. Look for a sunset at 5:55 pm with dusk around 6:24 pm, which is 1 minutes and 18 seconds earlier than yesterday. On Sunday, with the time change, the sun will set at 4:48 pm. I hate commuting home in the dark on the express bus this time of year. It’s so dark in Glenmont on the Delmar Bypass. Today will have 10 hours and 14 minutes of daylight, a decrease of 2 minutes and 35 seconds over yesterday.

Tonight will have a slight chance of showers between 9pm and midnight. More clouds as the evening progresses. Low of 51 degrees at 3am. 16 degrees above normal. Maximum dew point of 49 at 6am. Southeast wind 6 to 10 mph. Chance of precipitation is 20%. One year ago, partly cloudy with a  low around 39. The record low of 19 occurred back in 2002.

We are now one week out from  Election Day when the sun will be setting at 4:46 pm with dusk at 5:16 pm (Standard Time). The average high temperature is 51 degrees, with a record high of 75 in 1975. There are 6 days, 12 hours and 21 minutes until the polls close in NY State on Election Day.