Good morning! Happy Deep and Dark December 🎄! At least if you are a Simon and Garfunkel fan. Two weeks to Bill of Rights Day 📜. Partly cloudy and 29 degrees in the land of the Delmaritian. ⛅ Calm wind. Black ice on the driveway and grass will start to thaw out at around 9 am. 🌡️ Depending if I decide to drive somewhere this morning I may need to find the ice scrapper. Maybe I should instead hike somewhere. Beats scraping ice.

Today will be partly sunny 🌞, with a high of 36 degrees at 1pm. Five degrees below normal, which is similiar to a typical day around December 14th. At least we have the sun which is a rare thing in Trump’s America. Light and variable wind. A year ago, we had mostly cloudy skies with some clearing in the afternoon. The high last year was 45 degrees. The record high of 67 was set in 1934. 3.7 inches of snow fell back in 1969.❄

The sun will set at 4:22 pm with dusk around 4:54 pm, which is 18 seconds earlier than yesterday. 🌇 At sunset, look for partly cloudy skies 🌃 and temperatures around 35 degrees. There will be a calm wind. Nicer than most evenings of recent. Today will have 9 hours and 16 minutes of daytime, a decrease of one minute and 22 seconds over yesterday.

Tonight will rain and snow likely before 11pm, then rain and sleet between 11pm and 3am, then rain after 3am. 🌧 Low of 33 degrees at 6pm. Six degrees above normal, which is similiar to a typical night around November 12th. Southeast wind 3 to 8 mph. Chance of precipitation is 90%. New snow and sleet accumulation of less than a half inch possible. In 2017, we had mostly cloudy skies. It got down to 26 degrees. The record low of -2 occurred back in 1875.

Last night I watched some YouTube videos I previously had downloaded, worked on maps and code projects I’ve been working. 💻 Fixed some minor glitches on my VMS display that keeps me entertained with useless weather facts.

Once I finish my coffee I will head out somewhere for the day. ☕ I am not sure, I guess if the ice is melted off the windshield I could go down to Schodack Island for a change. I’m not super excited about going anywhere far away despite being a sunny day. 🏃 I really have gotten tired of driving. I don’t really know why. After my walk I should go to the store and pick up a few things. Alternatively I could walk out to Five Rivers but I’ve been there a lot lately. Nice morning with lots of sun, it would be a pity to waste it.

As previously noted, there are 2 weeks until Bill of Rights Day 📜 when the sun will be setting at 4:22 pm with dusk at 4:54 pm. Better have a candle handy to read your constitution with the days so short. Or as Phil Ochs once sung, “tell the police about your rights as they drag you along the ground.” The constitution is only as good as the people enforcing it. Otherwise it’s just another piece of paper in the burn barrel. On that day in 2017, we had snow, mostly cloudy skies and temperatures between 22 and 7 degrees. Typically, the high temperature is 36 degrees. We hit a record high of 61 back in 2015.