Good evening! Cloudy and 36 degrees in Delmar, NY. ☁ There is a west breeze at 8 mph. 🍃. Temperatures will drop below freezing at tomorrow around 1 am. ☃️

Today was another real quiet day at work, 📹 the Zoom meeting was called off so I didn’t shower until midday. 🚿 All day I’ve had some diaherea 💩 and I have had to spend more time on the toilet 🚽 then I would like to admit. At least working from home didn’t have to take a sick day.

Got my gear out and ready for camping ⛺. Not planning a big trip, just a few days away to enjoy some quiet. I’m disabling my cellphone 📱 and I’m leaving the radio 📻 home as I’m tired 😴 of hearing non stop Coronavirus coverage. Truth be told, next weekend looks better ☀ than this one but it could change before then and who knows the way things are going there might be travel restrictions by then. ⛔ I’m hoping not, and I might even do a long weekend next week if it’s nice enough. I’m tired 😴 of being in my moldy apartment so much.

This evening I went to the store got beer, motor oil, money 💵 and a few other supplies that I couldn’t get at Aldi. All of Walmart was open, they had queues at the doors but they weren’t open. Dropped the paper 📄 and old clothes and boots off at the recycling center at the park and ride ♻. Checked the fluids, topped off the oil and did a quick visual inspection of the belts and suspension and solar system wiring. Still need to get milk 🐮 and air up the tires in Red, that’s better to do when the tires are cold in the morning.

Most every thing is packed except for my personal gear like the toothbrush, pots and pans 🍳 I need for breakfast and the guns I didn’t want to leave overnight in the truck. If I camp where I plan there is a good backstop for shooting. 🔫 Everything is closed down here – hard to practice. I also updated my fishing license 🎣 and I have the PDF on my phone if I get asked for it.

Spent some time cleaning in the kitchen 🚿 treating the cabinets for mold and scrubbing down the counters so things won’t be so gross when I get home. One of these days it’s going to get hot ♨ and it will be important to have things as mold free as possible before the humanity peaks. Once the windows are open I’ll repaint the refrigerator which is rusty again.

It seems cleaning good with bleach kills off any RNA of Coronavirus I might have accidentally tracked in. 👾 Somehow reading 📖 about that 39 year old farmer in Cansastota who is fighting for his life on a ventalator🚜 makes it a lot more real to me. Caronavirus is remarkably bad and spreading fast with farm families who are struggling a lot already. That said, closing the boat launches 🚤 and other activities seems silly and over the top. At least the Glenmont Car Wash is open so I can wash the salt off my truck after I get back – I checked tonight. 👍

Tonight will have isolated snow showers before midnight. Mostly clear 🌃, with a low of 30 degrees at 4am. Eight degrees below normal, which is similar to a typical night around March 28th. West wind 6 to 8 mph. Chance of precipitation is 20%. In 2019, we had cloudy skies in the evening, which became mostly clear by the early hours of the morning. It got down to 32 degrees. The record low of 21 occurred back in 1971.

Tonight will have a Waining Crescent 🌘 Moon with 29% illuminated. The darkest hour is at 12:56 am, followed by dawn at 5:43 am, and sun starting to rise at 6:12 am in the east-northeast (75°) and last for 2 minutes and 59 seconds. Sunrise is one minute and 36 seconds earlier than yesterday. 🌄 The golden hour ends at 6:50 am with sun in the east (82°). Tonight will have 10 hours and 30 minutes of darkness, a decrease of 2 minutes and 44 seconds over last night.

Tomorrow will have increasing clouds ☁, with a high of 48 degrees at 2pm. 11 degrees below normal, which is similar to a typical day around March 25th. West wind 7 to 10 mph. A year ago, we had partly cloudy skies in the morning with some clearing in the afternoon. The high last year was 62 degrees. The record high of 91 was set in 2002. 0.3 inches of snow fell back in 1965.❄ Albany might break that record tomorrow depending on when the snow starts tomorrow night and if we get any tonight.

I think where I will be there won’t be a lot of snow ⛄, maybe a dusting come morning but I brought the snow shovel to be safe. The NOAA snow map shows none up there now but I wouldn’t be surprised to see a dusting when I get up there. Even if we get some the sun will make it disappear by morning most likely.

I have work until five o’clock, but maybe if the work load is light I’ll leave early and I can always work on it up at camp on Saturday. ⛺ I want to get set up fairly early as even though the days are longer now its not summer yet by any means. Supposedly it will clear by afternoon. And I’m just thinking a short leg stretcher hike on Saturday with a longer one on Sunday night where hopefully I won’t see another person. 🚶 If I do social distancing won’t be hard.

I didn’t get my stimulus check 💵 because I didn’t owe or getting anything back from the federal government this year. So I have to give them my bank information. 🔢 Unlike owing the state. I’ll have to do that at some point. I’m going to split it between index 📇 funds and my higher interest savings account and not touch the money for a while. I think there a lot of potential eventually for good market growth. I don’t see myself getting out of New York for at least a few more years.

In four weeks on May 14 the sun will be setting in the west-northwest (297°) at 8:10 pm,🌄 which is 31 minutes and 13 seconds later then tonight. In 2019 on that day, we had rain showers, cold weather partly cloudy skies later and temperatures between 48 and 40 degrees. Probably one of the coldest mid May day on record. Typically, you have temperatures between 69 and 46 degrees. The record high of 93 degrees was set back in 1900.

By then, hopefully the Coronavirus shutdown will be over 👾 but if not my hope is that it will be at least nice enough to work outside all day or even sit out at Five Rivers with the laptop or the library in a comfortable lawn chair. 💺 Folks are already getting itchy about the shutdown and if the political winds shift and other states reopen they’ll be a lot of pressure to reboot things. 🚍 Honestly, at that point I might still be a bit nervous about riding the bus or waiting at a busy bus stop 🚏downtown but I am getting a bit better at washing my hands 👏and getting used to wearing the bandana over my face. 😷

Looking ahead, Flower Moon 🌕 is in 3 weeks and Average High is 70 🐮 is a month away.

🇺🇸🦅Only 36 days remain until the start of Memorial Day Weekend!🦅🇺🇸

Good evening! Partly clear and 46 degrees in Delmar, NY. There is a north breeze at 10 mph. 🍃. It’s a nice moonlit night 🌃 and with lots of stars ✨ and not too cold. It is That said, with the breeze it’s cold out back and I think I’ll retire to bed shortly where it’s warmer.

It was a nice day for a Hump Day. 🐪 I haven’t been following Homesteady on YouTube to see if they have any more of their cammel dairy videos, although they still have their Jerseys too. 🐮 Camel milk apparently is good for children and their nursing mothers who are allergic to cows milk. Need a special stall a camels aren’t shaped like cows, even though they have four quarters and teats like cows. Great YouTube channel though.

Another pretty quiet day at work, and I worked from either outside or in my truck all afternoon. 💻 I think people were impressed by me in the Zoom meeting from my backyard with the trees, the High School and the Heldebergs in the background. Even though my apartment isn’t very nice there is a lot to be said about where I live in Delmar. I’ll probably stay here until I leave the state for good, I just can’t imagine buying land in New York.

Maybe it’s because I know how the sausage 🍣are made. Yeap, they grind up all the low desirability cuts of meat to tenderize it, use part of the intestines for the casing. That book 📙 I read some ago on butchering was fantastic. Sounds gross but then you realize it’s just a mixture of grass and fermented corn silage the cows been eating all day. Almost all corn silage 🌽 are and the majority of hay fed to cows is produced on the farm where they’re raised in New York State, although sometimes other grains like corn itself are purchased. But that’s beyond the point, I was in Clarksville today and it got me thinking about it all. At least I got paid on Tuesday unlike state employees or the many non essential employees they have been laid off during Coronavirus. For that I can thank my lucky stars. 🌟

I decided after going out to Five Rivers Environmental Education Center to hike Bennett Hill again. 🚶 It was a nice evening up on Bennett Hill but it got cloudy ⛅ later on. A lot of people up there again, which is annoying because I really take serious being at 10 or more feet away from people – or even further in physical distancing, as the term is. I’ve noticed the last two times I’ve been up there it’s been super clear – I think the reduced haze is from less air pollution due to fewer drivers and businesses being open. That certainly is the case in Los Angeles. Then I came home and went for my evening 🌃 walk on this very moonlit evening.

Five Rivers was nice – spring peepers are out in force around Skeeter Pond.🐸 I got a whole lot of podcasts and videos to listen to next few days on the exercise bike or elsewhere. My neighbor has been gone all day – he works shift work, I wonder if he’s a nurse or involved in the Coronavirus response. I also got a text saying that my phone plan is giving me an extra 10 gigabytes monthly through the end of May, so I can use over a gigabyte of high speed data each day or 35 gigabytes per 30 days. Kind of nice to not have to worry about bandwidth so much on my phone not having internet at home.

Tonight will be partly cloudy 🌤, with a low of 34 degrees at 6am. Two degrees above normal, which is similar to a typical night around April 6th. North wind 7 to 10 mph. In 2019, we had clear skies in the evening, which became partly cloudy by the early hours of the morning. It got down to 22 degrees. The record low of 17 occurred back in 1964. I’m hoping at this point the heat can be off until November.

Tonight will have a Waxing Gibbous 🌔 Moon with 58% illuminated. At 9 PM, the moon was in the southwest (222°) at an altitude of 66° from the horizon, some 234,681 miles away from where you are looking up from the earth. 🚀 At the state speed limit of 55 mph, you’ll make it there by September 26^th. Buckle up for safety! 💺 Being relatively close to the earth its quite bright. The Pink 🌸 Moon is on Tuesday, April 7. The darkest hour is at 1:00 am, followed by dawn at 6:09 am, and sun starting to rise at 6:38 am in the east (83°) and last for 2 minutes and 55 seconds. Sunrise is one minute and 44 seconds earlier than yesterday. 🌄 The golden hour ends at 7:15 am with sun in the east (89°). Tonight will have 11 hours and 12 minutes of darkness, a decrease of 2 minutes and 51 seconds over last night.

Tomorrow will be mostly cloudy 🌥, with a high of 53 degrees at 3pm. One degree above normal, which is similar to a typical day around April 3rd. Northwest wind 9 to 16 mph, with gusts as high as 29 mph. I think the morning is supposed to be better with clouds by afternoon. I have the work laptop so I won’t have to go to the library or Five Rivers for work stuff, and I have plenty of podcasts and videos to watch at home if I want. A year ago, we had mostly sunny skies. The high last year was 53 degrees. The record high of 77 was set in 2010. 8 inches of snow fell back in 1924.❄

I‘ve decided this weekend is a good one to stay in town for but assuming that the weather is nice for the long Easter weekend 🐰I am still thinking about 3 nights in the Adirondacks leaving Thursday after work or maybe actually jotting out a bit early. I doubt where I am I’ll see any one else. Do some hiking and fishing 🎣, making sure to stay six feet or even further AWAY. ☺ Still some snow up north but not a lot and I expect it to continue melting next week.

Continuing on and off to work on the updated blog theme. 📝 It’s a work in progress with many parts unfinished but it will focus on being more of an immersive full screen experience like some of those popular photo blogs. 📷 Maybe I won’t adopt the new theme, I’m not sure but I have the time to work on it, although soon my work load will pick back up – but in the meantime I’m still saving a lot of time by not having the commute or ironing shirts 👚 or getting prepared for work each day and leaving at a set time.

From time to time I see the advertisement for Northwood Mapping a business out of Wisconsin which does professional mapping for land owners and hunters. 🌐 He has some interesting products for sure, stuff I could probably do myself and have printed professionally – the thing is print shop costs aren’t cheap and it’s tough making it self employed. Folks do it like Lynne Jackson from Save the Pine Bush but it ain’t easy. Remarkably expensive to run a business. At any rate it doesn’t hurt to hone my mapping skills🗾 and continue to get my name out there with the blog.

In four weeks on April 29 the sun will be setting in the west-northwest (291°) at 7:53 pm,🌄 which is 31 minutes and 51 seconds later then tonight. In 2019 on that day, we had mostly sunny skies for a while than rain showers and temperatures between 58 and 31 degrees. Typically, you have temperatures between 64 and 42 degrees. The record high of 88 degrees was set back in 1888.

Looking ahead, Pink Moon 🌕 is in 1 weeks, Tax Day 💰 is in 2 weeks, Earth Day 🌎 is in 3 weeks, May 🕊 is a month away, June 🍹 is in 2 months, Latest Sunset 🌆 is in 12 weeks and Inauguration Day 2021 👴🏻 is in 42 weeks.

🇺🇸🦅Only 50 days remain until the start of Memorial Day Weekend!🦅🇺🇸