Smile, it’s the weekend. Not the sunniest or warmest weekend after, but it’s good to get out and enjoy it. Leading in theory a Save the Pine Bush hike at 9 AM, though who knows if  anyone will show up. But it’s a good excuse to get up early, get going so I will go hiking, then check out Salvation Army for some nice business-casual shirts and then do some shopping early on.

Good morning! Happy Saturday. Finally the weekend! I won’t say it’s a banner of weekend weather wise, but it’s not snowing and not cold. Cloudy and 36 degrees at the Elm Ave Park and Ride. ☁ There is a north-northwest breeze at 6 mph. 🍃. Temperatures will drop below freezing at Monday around 1 am. ☃️

Today will be cloudy ☁, with a high of 40 degrees at 2pm. Seven degrees above normal, which is similar to a typical day around February 28th. North wind around 6 mph. A year ago, we had mostly sunny skies in the morning, which became mostly sunny by afternoon. The high last year was 36 degrees. The record high of 62 was set in 1974. 9.3 inches of snow fell back in 1963.❄

I intentionally planned a Save the Pine Bush Hike at 9 AM this morning 🌲 so I would have an incentive to get out hiking early this morning, and hopefully have some people to join me. Not the nicest day ever but with some friends it could be nice. And if nobody shows up — and for later in the afternoon — I’ll bring my mountain bike. 🚵 Often I find riding in the Pine Bush to be a little soft without fat bike tires but after the recent rain and snow, I expect the sand to be quite well packed and good for riding. I will probably will ride the East Barrens though I haven’t done Blueberry Hill in a while and that could be a good place to watch the sun set.

Solar noon 🌞 is at 12:09 pm with sun having an altitude of 28.8° from the due south horizon (-42° vs. 6/21). A six foot person will cast a 10.9 foot shadow today compared to 2.2 feet on the first day of summer. The golden hour 🏅 starts at 4:19 pm with the sun in the west-southwest (238°). 📸 The sunset is in the west-southwest (245°) with the sun dropping below the horizon at 5:02 pm after setting for 3 minutes and 12 seconds with dusk around 5:31 pm, which is one minute and 17 seconds later than yesterday. 🌇 The best time to look at the stars is after 6:06 pm. At sunset, look for mostly cloudy skies ☁ and temperatures around 39 degrees. There will be a calm wind. Today will have 9 hours and 50 minutes of daytime, an increase of 2 minutes and 9 seconds over yesterday.

After the hike this morning 🏃‍♀️ my plan is go over to the Salvation Army and look at shirts to wear 👔 for cheap, and maybe desk lamps. I don’t think my new office I’ll be moving into in March from my temporary desk has a desk lamp, and I’ve really gotten to like that brass desk lamp I had in my old office 🛋 as I don’t like the overhead florescent lighting. The darker lit office with task lighting just seems a lot more comfortable to work in. Then I’m hoping to get to Aldi’s and get some groceries 🛒 followed up by Yonder Farms for apples 🍎 and maybe stopped at Hannaford in Voorheesville so I can get more whole-wheat flour. 🍞 I’ve also thought about potentially exploring more of the Erie Canalway Trail and the Stockade in Schenectady, 🚲 but we’ll see how tired I am by mid-day. At any rate, I like to keep my options open. ⛽ I also need to get some fuel for my big-jacked up truck. That said, at least gas prices have come down.

Tonight will have a slight chance of rain and snow after 4am. Cloudy 🌧, with a low of 33 degrees at 1am. 18 degrees above normal, which is similar to a typical night around April 5th. Light and variable wind. Chance of precipitation is 20%. In 2023, we had light snow in the evening, which became mostly clear by the early hours of the morning. It got down to 25 degrees. The record low of -16 occurred back in 2005.

Yesterday, I had my diversity training 👩‍🏫 which was remarkably interesting. What a difference a good professor really can make. It really gives you a chance to reflect upon how you view the world. So many years diversity training is overally legalistic and not enough reflection, but this year it really gave me some chance to think about my biases. I ended the day working in my old office, which was nice to catch up with some my colleagues and not feel like I’m in North Siberia, as often is the case up in the suburban office.

I’ve been continuing to explore how to use the R Statistical Language at work to automate processes and clean data. 💽 So much of my work in my new job is data-centric, and the tidyverse is such a handy way to process lots of data quickly. One of my goals is get away from PDF reports and presenting more data as nicely formatted Excel spreadsheets, as it makes it much more easier for users to produce calculations on their own computer. I installed R Studio on my work computer, though I with I could get Docker working and therefore Rselenium up and running on it, so I could automate some of the report generation by using a Selenium controlled browser. In theory I don’t need Docker but so far I can’t seem to figure out to get RSelenium to find Java I installed on the computer. Strange thing is OpenXLSX see Java without a problem.

Tomorrow looking at rain and snow, mainly after 8am. 🌧 High near 35. Calm wind becoming north 5 to 8 mph in the morning. Chance of precipitation is 90%. Total daytime snow accumulation of less than one inch possible. Going to try to get out to my parents house tomorrow, a lot depends on the weather. I might end up going to Walmart tomorrow, especially if I don’t get everything I need at Aldi’s today, most notably whole-wheat flour.

Looking ahead, there are 2 weeks until Clean Your Computer Day 🧹 when the sun will be setting at 5:21 pm with dusk at 5:49 pm. On that day in 2023, we had mostly cloudy, mild, rain showers and temperatures between 51 and 34 degrees. Typically, the high temperature is 35 degrees. We hit a record high of 53 back in 1955.