John Boyd Thacher State Park, is situated along the Helderberg Escarpment, one of the richest fossil-bearing formations in the world. Even as it safeguards six miles of limestone cliff-face, rock-strewn slopes, woodland and open fields, the park provides a marvelous panorama of the Hudson-Mohawk Valleys and the Adirondack and Green Mountains. The park has volleyball courts, playgrounds, ball fields and numerous picnic areas with nine reservable shelters. Interpretive programs are offered year-round, including guided tours of the famous Indian Ladder Trail. There are over 25 additional miles of trails for summer hiking and mountain biking, and winter cross-country skiing, snowshoeing, hiking, and snowmobiling.
Cold but sunny day to close out February. But in a month it will be an average of 50 in the afternoon with some days much warmer. Sunny, cold and 15 degrees in Delmar, NY. 🌞 There is a west breeze at 8 mph. 🍃. The current wind chill is 4. There are 5 inches of snow on the ground. ☃ ️Things will start to thaw out at tomorrow around 11 am. 🌡️
Stumbling around a bit this morning I got out for my walk closer to 7:10 then the 6:45 so it was more the rush hour by the school 🚸 then I preferred although there weren’t that many idling cars and buses smoking 🚬 and it was still before peak traffic. But I’m past that part of the walk 🚶.
Pancakes 🥞 with blueberries and strawberries on top this morning. 🍓 My dress shirts are pants are ironed and ready for when I get home and then shower 🚿. Boiled, washed and ironed are my muzzles for the week ahead. 😷 People are celebrating no more muzzle mandates but I like my muzzles and I still have to wear them on the bus 🚍 so I might as well wear it in the elevator. Not sure when they are going to drop the muzzle mandate at work away from the desk but I don’t see the harm of wearing them in crowded locations.
Fixed the broken tail light bulb 💡 in my truck. Apparently the taillight fixture has a leak and had filled up with water and the hot bulb exploded in the fixture. I couldn’t believe how I dumped out a half gallon of water 💦 out of the tail light. I’m actually surprised 🤨 I didn’t blow a fuse. The bottom screw in the fixture was badly corroded but with a lot of WD 40 and a properly fitting screw driver I was able to liberate it. I was worried a bit though as I didn’t want to bugger up the limited thread remaining on the Phillips head.
Didn’t get out skiing 🎿 yesterday as by mid day the snow was terribly sloppy. The truth was I was frustrated 😤 by the tail light bulb and chilled by not being dressed warm enough when I was working on the bulb early in the morning. 🌅 And the truth be told I’m tired and so done with winter, my mind on spring. 🌸 Plus when you keep the heat down to keep the bills affordable I’m already cold. ❄ Plus the clouds rolled in by mid day and the wind picked up and I was working on an R project so I had yet another excuse.
It’s amazing how passionate the defenders of Ukraine really are. I’m no fan of politics of Ukraine but I certainly don’t agree with Russia coming in and trying to liberate Ukraine’s people either. I think people should live and let live, we don’t have any business butting into other countries business.
Probably a lot of people just see it through the lens of partisan politics – if you are a vivid defender of Ukraine, you are a good Democrat while the Trump supporters are backing Russia. But I also see backing Ukraine as no different than backing the Taliban in Afghanistan in the 1980s against the USSR. The enemies of our enemies are not our friends.
I don’t like supporting war either on behalf of Ukraine or Russia. Doesn’t matter if you are supplying weapons to either side, you are still supporting war and human suffering. Ukraine is no saint, they don’t deserve to be invaded but they also shouldn’t be doing business with neo-Nazis or human rights abusers. We should be calling for peace not for arming right wing extremists in Ukraine.
Eco-lifestyle consumerism of dubious values seems to be all the rage these days. Many smart marketers have figured out that it’s easy to sell new products to urban consumers who feel guilty about their consumption and ecological impact.
The newest one is buying into “community solar farms” that are these vast areas of farm land covered by solar panels that sell into the grid. The consumer pays a little extra on his or her bill – or maybe about the same with tax credits – and they subsidize the construction of these urbanized farm fields or former forests. They argue it’s carbon-free energy, although it’s heavily backed up fossil generation of the grid. The fossil plants work “less hard” with “less load” so they burn less fuel when assisted by the solar, but it’s still all supported by our fossil-fuel grid while using up valuable farm land and forest land. If we took land that was going to be a solar farms and put it into traditional non-urban uses, what would be the impact on the climate? It would at least be less ugly solar farms to look at.
Geothermal heat that uses refrigerant to pump or dump heat out of the earth using large quantities of electricity is also a popular thing – it’s a new high-end product that can be sold by well drillers – who traditionally could only market their service to rural dwellers beyond the city water supply. I’m equally cynical about this technology, because it uses incredible amounts of electrical energy to power it – theoretically from renewable sources – but rarely that’s case as intense amount of energy to power a geothermal system comes from the fossil-fuel grid.
I don’t discredit the early pioneers in this green technology, but I think it’s valid to ask questions, even if we shouldn’t be necessarily defending the status quo. Certainly, we should be doing everything to get solar panels on existing buildings, as solar is proven technology that is simple and inexpensive. It doesn’t consume land on existing structures, it is long lasting, even if it’s as toxic as the rest of electronics it powers. I think we should increase efficiency standards on new buildings and furnaces, work to do more to improve energy efficiency on existing buildings. Geothermal should be considered as an alternative to air-source heat pumps both in existing and new buildings, but it should not be promoted as a way to “consume more” with “zero impact”.
It’s stupid to ignore the climate crisis we are all facing. But throwing money at so-called green technologies that do little to actually address the problem of over consumption and over population isn’t necessarily a good answer.
Not going to be that warm tomorrow. Actually, about 19 degrees below normal but sunny. But short-term cold trends can’t last forever. I am sure before you know it the windows will be open and the heat off. By the end of March, the average high is 50 degrees, and every day with the strengthening sun angle, it just gets harder and harder to remain cold. I sure hope we can stop talking about the wind chill soon.
Next weekend I might try to get out of town, it really depends on the final forecast as we get closer to then. That campsite in Renselaerville is always nice, but I also haven’t been up to the Adirondacks since last September so I wouldn’t mind going up north. The weekend after next weekend, starts daylight savings time, which will make the mornings darker but not that dark as the days are rapidly growing in length, but the sunset will be much later after the time change.
Today. Feels like … March 5th.
Partly sunny.
Southwest wind 9 to 16 mph becoming west in the afternoon. Winds could gust as high as 32 mph.
and
41 degrees
,
5:42 sunset.
Tonight. Cold !
A chance of rain and snow showers before 7pm, then a chance of snow showers between 7pm and 10pm. Mostly cloudy, then gradually becoming mostly clear.
Wind chill values as low as -3. Northwest wind 10 to 18 mph, with gusts as high as 37 mph. Chance of precipitation is 50%. New snow accumulation of less than a half inch possible.
and
10 degrees
,-3 max wind chill,
6:32 sunrise.
Monday. Cold !
Sunny.
Wind chill values as low as -3. Northwest wind 9 to 11 mph.
and
21 degrees
,-3 max wind chill,
5:43 sunset.
Monday Night. Cold !
Partly cloudy.
Northwest wind around 6 mph becoming calm in the evening.
and
6 degrees
,4 max wind chill,
6:30 sunrise.
Tuesday. Feels like … February 27th.
A slight chance of rain and snow showers after 1pm. Mostly cloudy.
Light southeast wind becoming south 9 to 14 mph in the morning. Winds could gust as high as 24 mph. Chance of precipitation is 20%.
and
39 degrees
,5 max wind chill,
5:44 sunset.
Tuesday Night. Feels like … March 20th.
A chance of rain and snow showers before 10pm, then a chance of snow showers between 10pm and 1am. Mostly cloudy.
Chance of precipitation is 40%. New precipitation amounts of less than a tenth of an inch possible.
and
27 degrees
,
6:28 sunrise.
Wednesday. Feels like … February 24th.
Partly sunny.
and
38 degrees
,
5:46 sunset.
Wednesday Night. Feels like … March 4th.
A chance of snow showers between 7pm and 1am. Mostly cloudy.
Another nice sunny morning, not too cold. Last weekend of February, so like usual, things moderate quite a bit by this time of year. Yesterday was above freezing, so a lot of snow melted away from Friday’s snow storm, which is good because my snow shovel is broken.
Partly sunny and 28 degrees in Delmar. 😎 There is a south-southwest breeze at 9 mph. 🍃. There are 6 inches of snow on the ground. ☃ ️Things will start to thaw out at around 9 am. 🌡️
Yesterday, I walked out to Five Rivers. 🐦 I was happy to see that the Red-Winged Blackbirds are back in mass, that is always an early sign of spring. There were dozens of them around Five Rivers. 🦉 I also heard a long-eared owl (identified with a bit of help from Merlin) and then walked out along Meads Road, looking at the beef cattle. 🐮 They still very much have their shaggy coats but it’s still pretty cold and Herefords actually have much thicker coats then dairy breeds.
I also finished up my free GIS class homework 🗺 and worked on some different coding projects. 👨💻 While I already knew a lot of things that they teach in the class, each week I discover a new feature in QGIS that I wasn’t aware of. I’ve also been doing a lot of reading and watching Youtube videos, trying to discover new skills for making more attractive maps —
Today I am thinking I will go skiing out at Five Rivers ⛷ and then out to the folks house for Sunday dinner. 🍽 I don’t want to get out there too late, as they are talking about heavy snow squalls after 6 PM. 🌨 I also want to get that light bulb in my truck taillight.💡 Looks easy enough to replace, just two screws. I found a bulb that I had bought as a set for my old truck, and it looks like it still works. Otherwise I’ll have to run to the store and buy a bulb.
Lately since the invasion of Ukraine by Russia there has been a celebration of all things Ukraine, as if the country was some kind of über perfect nation, a model for the world, hopelessly attacked unprovoked by Russia. The celebrators of Ukraine say any criticism of Ukraine is just Russian propaganda and is entirely unjustified as the hopeless nation is under attack.
But that is ignoring the nation’s history of corruption, instability, bad governance and abuse of individual’s civil liberties and rights, especially of the Russian-speaking population living in the western and southern portions of the country, especially the Crimean peninsula and the heavily populated and Russian-native dominated breakaway providences of Donets’k and Luhas’k. Or how the country’s leaders has regularly worked with the neo-nazi sympathetic Azov Battalion in it’s abuse of the Russian-population.
The truth is Ukraine’s leadership partially brought it’s problems upon itself. Russia wouldn’t have invaded Ukraine if not in part for a large sympathetic population of Russian-speaking Ukraine residents who have been abused by their government and want to be liberated. In many ways, Ukraine’s government is a lot like the Taliban — backed by Al Queda and terribly abusive to it’s people.
Now to be clear, Russia’s attack on Ukraine is not justified. Just like the United States’ attack on Afghanistan wasn’t justified either. Other countries shouldn’t be attempting to liberate other countries, no matter how badly they treat their people. That said, other nations shouldn’t be dealing with evil by engaging in commerce, or subsidizing abusive governments.
In contrast, pressure should be put on bad governments, like Russia and Ukraine to enforce human rights protections. Indeed, Ukraine was on the right track by trying to join the European Union and NATO, but they needed to reform how they were governing their people before joining the western community. Russia shouldn’t have invaded Ukraine but neither should have Ukraine abused Russians to extent they have done.
Have you noticed how much light there is in the mornings and afternoons? It’s nice. Spring is coming.
Night before dawn is 6 hours and 6 minutes, Dawn starts at 6:06 am and runs for 28 minutes, Sunrise is at 6:35 am which is 5 hours and 24 minutes before noon, High noon, the transit of the sun, is at 12:08 pm, From twelve noon to the sunset at 5:41 pm is 5 hours and 41 minutes, Dusk lasts for 31 minutes concluding at 6:09 pm, Leaving 5 hours and 50 minutes until midnight.
