Day: February 15, 2017

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HDMI to VGA Adapter

Got the $6 HDMI to VGA adapter in the mail today. Too late for this month’s Save the Pine Bush Dinner but that’s fine. I was able to play the slideshow on Lynne Jackson’s laptop. 

For the hell of it, I hooked up the adapter to the HDMI output of my DTV adapter and ran it through the VGA input on my monitor. Works perfectly, I don’t see any loss of resolution. Probably wouldn’t want to drive the laptop that way for office apps, as I’m guessing it’s slightly lower quality than an all digital connection, but it should be more than fine to use for future Save the Pine Bush slideshows.

February 15, 2017 9 PM Update

“I think the Pine Bush dinner was a success. Dishes got washed and things went well. Halfway through the week. Not too cold. Look forward to getting home and watching the PBS Newshour. Then bedtime. Not too bad of a day.” 

Good evening! Mostly cloudy and 32 degrees in City of Albany. There is a west-northwest breeze at 13 mph. That wind makes it feel pretty chilly this evening even though in protected areas it feels somewhat mild. The skies will clear tomorrow around 9 pm.

Tonight will have a slight chance of snow showers. Cloudy, with a low of 25 degrees at 6am. Eight degrees above normal. West wind 13 to 15 mph. Chance of precipitation is 20%. In 2016, it got down to 18 degrees with periods of fog and rain. The record low of -20 occurred back in 1943.

Waning Gibbous Moon tonight with 66% illuminated. The Last Quarter Moon is on Saturday night with mostly cloudy skies expected. The Full β€œWorm” Moon is on Sunday, March 12th. The sun will rise at 6:50 am with the first light at 6:21 am, which is 1 minutes and 25 seconds earlier then yesterday. Tonight will have 13 hours and 20 minutes of darkness, a decrease of 2 minutes and 44 seconds over last night.

Tomorrow will have a slight chance of snow showers. Mostly cloudy, with a high of 31 degrees at 2pm. Four degrees below normal. Northwest wind 15 to 17 mph. Chance of precipitation is 20%. A year ago, we had fog, rain and a high of 56 degrees. The record high of 61 was set in 2006. 17.3 inches of snow fell back in 1958.

Going to be nice this weekend. Saturday, partly sunny, with a high near 39. Sunday, mostly sunny, with a high near 45.Typical average high for the weekend is 35 degrees.

In four weeks on March 15 the sun will be setting at 7:02 pm (Daylight Savings Time), which is 1 hour and 34 minutes later then tonight. In 2016 on that day, we had cloudy skies and temperatures between 58 and 39 degrees. Typically, you have temperatures between 44 and 25 degrees. The record high of 72 degrees was set back in 1989.

Looking ahead, March 1st is in 2 weeks, Ides of March is a month away, Average High is 60 is in 9 weeks, Flag Day is in 17 weeks and Summer is in 18 weeks.

Are Electric Cars Greener?

Are Electric Cars Greener?

"It's also easier to clean up, maintain and monitor one smokestack (the power plant's) than it is to do those things for a million smokestacks (all of our tailpipes). And even if you're charging your car from the dirtiest power plant, running on 100 percent coal, electric-car expert (and, to be fair, advocate) Jim Motavalli says you'd still reduce climate emissions by 30 to 40 percent over individual gasoline-powered cars."

February 15, 2017 – Next Sixteen Weeks

Sixteen weeks from now will be June.Β There is hope for warmer weather and it’s in a foreseeable future. Already the sunsets have gotten much longer, and starting next week, we will be seeing sizable increases in the average high every week. Five weeks to calendar spring, in which the average high is 47 degrees in Albany.

In as few as four weeks,Β the weather might be nice enough to go to the park in the evening,Β and heck I’ve been truck camping in early March, although that’s usually something reserved for the warmest winters, not necessarily this winter.

Week Date Dawn Sun-
rise
Sun-
set
Dusk Day Avg High Avg Low Record Hi Record Low
0 February 15 6:21 am 6:50 am 5:27 pm 5:56 pm 10:37 35 17 55 (2006) -22 (1943)
1 February 22 6:11 am 6:39 am 5:36 pm 6:05 pm 10:57 36 19 68 (1997) -8 (1963)
2 March 1 6:00 am 6:28 am 5:45 pm 6:13 pm 11:17 39 21 61 (1991) -9 (1948)
3 March 8 5:48 am 6:16 am 5:54 pm 6:22 pm 11:37 41 23 68 (2012) -2 (1989)
4 March 15 6:36 am 7:04 am 7:02 pm 7:30 pm 11:57 44 25 72 (1989) 1 (1993)
5 March 22 6:24 am 6:52 am 7:10 pm 7:38 pm 12:17 47 28 81 (2012) 2 (1875)
6 March 29 6:12 am 6:40 am 7:18 pm 7:46 pm 12:38 50 31 85 (1946) 0 (1923)
7 April 5 5:59 am 6:28 am 7:26 pm 7:55 pm 12:58 54 33 82 (1928) 14 (2016)
8 April 12 5:47 am 6:16 am 7:34 pm 8:03 pm 13:17 57 36 84 (1977) 13 (1874)
9 April 19 5:35 am 6:05 am 7:42 pm 8:12 pm 13:37 60 39 92 (1976) 18 (1875)
10 April 26 5:24 am 5:54 am 7:50 pm 8:20 pm 13:55 63 41 90 (1990) 24 (1972)
11 May 3 5:14 am 5:45 am 7:58 pm 8:29 pm 14:13 66 43 89 (2001) 29 (1966)
12 May 10 5:04 am 5:36 am 8:06 pm 8:37 pm 14:29 68 45 92 (1970) 28 (1958)
13 May 17 4:56 am 5:29 am 8:13 pm 8:46 pm 14:43 70 47 89 (1977) 30 (1959)
14 May 24 4:50 am 5:23 am 8:20 pm 8:53 pm 14:56 72 50 92 (1964) 29 (1963)
15 May 31 4:45 am 5:19 am 8:26 pm 9:00 pm 15:06 74 52 92 (2013) 34 (1961)
16 June 7 4:42 am 5:17 am 8:31 pm 9:05 pm 15:13 76 54 95 (1999) 37 (1958)

Thin skim of ice on the deeper ponds

February 15, 2017 9 AM Update

“The only constant in the world is change, and some changes are good and some are personally devastating. That’s the conclusion I got from looking at the graph of the hilltown population over the years. The economy changes and sometimes people lose their livelihoods and half to move on. Despite promises of politicians, it’s very hard to reverse creative destruction of the economy but government can encourage new industries and new uses of the land. Exurban uses of the land, small homesteads and hunting camps brought back by increased wildlife replaced the agrarian economy of an earlier era. “

HeadingΒ into the 9 o’clock hour we are up to 34 degrees on our way up to 40 degrees. Some sun and breaks in the clouds, with some light snow showers later. Not a lot of snow, probably just a dusting and no more than a inch or two. Snow is starting to melt somewhat.

The sun will set at 5:28 pm with dusk around 5:57 pm, which is 1 minutes and 18 seconds later than yesterday. Today will have 10 hours and 37 minutes of daylight, an increase of 1 minutes and 43 seconds over yesterday.

Tonight will have a slight chance of snow. Cloudy, with a low of 26 degrees at 4am. Seven degrees above normal. West wind 13 to 18 mph, with gusts as high as 31 mph. Chance of precipitation is 20%. In 2016, it got down to 18 degrees with periods of fog and rain. The record low of -20 occurred back in 1943.

Tonight is theΒ Save the Pine Bush DinnerΒ at the Westminster Presbyterian Church. Tonight we have Chris Hauver of the Pine Bush Commission speaking. Throughout the evening we will have a slideshow of 1,912 photos — from the archives of Albany Pine Bush along with several photos I’ve taken over the year. I was going to use my laptop but due to the two snowstorms over the past week, my HDMI to VGA adapter was delayed in the mail. Save the Pine Bush’s projector is a few years old, and it doesn’t have HDMI, which is a new standard. It was only $10 and I was going to donate it to Save the Pine Bush after the showing, but I guess I will hold on to it for now and use it for a future presentation. Hopefully it will work well. I have a VGA port on my monitor, and I will test it out at home.

Watched the American Experience Special on Ruby Ridge, followed by Independent Lens show on the Charles Witman shooting at Austin college back in 1966. Talk about a depressing series of shows, but I like to be informed about history and how we got from there to where we are now. I still blame President Bill Clinton for much of the 1990s, the heightened hatred he spawned by his unneccessarily atagonistic policies towards the west. I think Bill Clinton is a lot of reason why the Democratic party is in as serious trouble as it now — there was a time when the Democratic Party was more focused on helping people and improving our infrastructure and not a party primarily focused on helping liberalΒ ideologues.

We are starting to head towards the big climb in temperatures as we head to spring time. Maybe 45 or 50 degrees come the weekend. We might get a few more big snow storms but I don’t expect snow to last at this point. We should have averages a few degrees above freezing everyday now.

As previously noted, there are 2 weeks until March 1st when the sun will be setting at 5:46 pm with dusk at 6:14 pm. On that day in 2016, we had rain and temperatures between 38 and 21 degrees. Typically, the high temperature is 39 degrees. We hit a record high of 61 back in 1991.

I hope it warms up a lot by the weekend,Β because I really don’t want to have to dig my truck out by the weekend. The landlord cleaned up the driveway nicely over the past few days, but my truck is still buried under a lot of snow. The good news is where it’s parked, I don’t have to move it for a while, and when I do, I can just knock the snow off it, because it’s not parked on the plowed driveway. Hopefully it won’t be all ice.

I’m almost to work! Have a great day.