Good morning! Happy Arbor Day. Without those trees we would have a whole lot less fun and mostly non toxic stuff to burn. Hah. Plus shade, clean air and habitat for the squirrels to shoot for fun. Next Friday is Cinco de Mayo. Showers around, generally cloudy and 62 degrees in Albany. There is a west-southwest breeze at 9 mph. The dew point is 55 degrees. The skies will clear around 8 am.

Today will be mostly sunny, with a high of 79 degrees at 3pm. 15 degrees above normal. Maximum dew point of 55 at 8am. West wind 9 to 13 mph. Going to be warm one but not too humid. I’m not complaining but why couldn’t have God held this weather off for one more day, e.g. the weekend. Thank you Trump for messing up my weekend. A year ago, we had mostly cloudy skies and a high of 58 degrees. The record high of 92 was set in 1990. There was a dusting of snow in 1966.

The sun will set at 7:52 pm with dusk around 8:23 pm, which is one minute and 8 seconds later than yesterday. Today will have 14 hours of daytime, an increase of 2 minutes and 33 seconds over yesterday.

Tonight will have increasing clouds, with a low of 55 degrees at 5am. 13 degrees above normal. Maximum dew point of 50 at 6am. West wind 6 to 8 mph becoming south in the evening. In 2016, it got down to 37 degrees under mostly cloudy skies. The record low of 27 occurred back in 1947.

As previously noted, next Friday is Cinco de Mayo when the sun will be setting at 8:00 pm with dusk at 8:31 pm. I’ll have to buy some Corona to celebrate drinking out back. On that day in 2016, we had cloudy skies and temperatures between 58 and 47 degrees. Typically, the high temperature is 66 degrees. We hit a record high of 91 back in 1944.

Today is going to a hot one but it won’t feel that bad with the humidity being relatively low. Last night’s very brief thunderstorm and recent rains are helping to keep fire risk low. Everything is remarkably damp despite the fact we didn’t get much rain in Delmar.

It was a nice evening at the park, although it got dark early with the clouds. But I still enjoyed the walk down there. I should have brought a book rather than my laptop but I did get some more videos uploaded. I have plenty of content for the next few days.

Sat our back for a while watching the PBS Newshour on the tailgate of my truck after dark. Retired to bed early as want to get an early start tomorrow, especially as they were going to be removing several trees at my apartment starting at 7:30 am.

I also listened to NPR’s Marketplace for the first time in a while walking down to the park, because most evenings I usually end up the Newshour at home. I should listen to the Newshour more so I can be better informed on what is happening in the world.

I was a little on the fence about going camping this weekend but I decided against it because I didn’t want the expense or the burden of getting all the camping gear out for marginal weather. I’m fine with waiting for nicer days to go camping. I guess if tomorrow turns out beautiful I could do a day trip somewhere or even spend Saturday night camping in the wilderness. But I expect to just hang out in town.

It’s interesting to read about the difference between Pennsylvania and New York on the Emerald Ash Borer. Penna tried a relatively weak quarantine but quickly abandoned it and now it is spread across most of the state. New York is doing a valent effort to try to slow the spread of EAB with an aggressive quarantine and firewood inspections but it’s not clear we are going to be any more successful at stopping the EAB. Indeed the DEC has been really quiet recently about the location of the EAB in our state but I suspect it’s going to be rooted in most of our state within the next few years with the ash tree largely gone from New York by 2025. Our ecology is changing, largely man driven and its clear we can’t always stop the change. I think the same may prove true about climate change.

Dropped off my dry cleaning this morning at the dry cleaners and drove to the park and ride. They are supposed to cut more of the shade trees in the yard, but so far the tree trimming crew hasn’t arrived. It supposed to make the plumbing work better but gosh I don’t know. I think most of the trees cut will impact the shade for the neighbors more then me because they cut my shade tree last year. I guess I will find out. It’s great they are chopping down my shade on Arbor Day. 

I’m almost to work. Just passed the $175 an hour waterfalls on the front of the Empire State Plaza. Have a good one. Enjoy the warmth.