WGN meteorologist Tom Skilling isn't sure:
This winter could for a number of reasons follow the lead of the past several winters and end up near or below normal. It would have to work at doing so. Bucking a strong El Nino isn’t impossible–but it’s not an easy thing for nature to do either.
Air over the warm ocean waters also warms, and this appears at least one factor in the build-up of a ridge over western North America which has contributed to the diversion of needed precipitation away from the western U.S. while contributing to the ridging (i.e. northward “buckling”) of the jet stream which has kept us cold in recent winters with huge Great Lakes ice buildup. It wouldn’t be hard to imagine some version of this happening again this winter–and that would profoundly change the current “warmer than normal” winter season forecast.
So while one of the strongest El Niños on record will exert some powerful effects on North American weather, the climate change we've already experienced may exert even stronger effects. The El Niño could simply reinforce the persistent ridge over the western US that has caused the last few Chicago winters to suck.
Can't wait to find out...
Given my priority on eating (and drinking) at Chicago Gourmet on Saturday, I didn't bring my real camera. I'm quite pleased with my phone, though. And the weather really was this gorgeous:
Local-news organization DNAinfo asked people to draw their neighborhood boundaries a while back. They now have results:
After getting thousands of drawings from DNAinfo readers, we wanted to show where there was broad agreement (and disagreement) about where each begins and ends.
On first glance, both Boystown and Wrigleyville residents make clear where they think their neighborhoods are.
The core of Wrigleyville — appropriately around Wrigley Field — is between Grace, Racine, Sheffield and Newport, readers say.
Boystown's core is Halsted, Addison, Broadway and Belmont.
But look at both maps and you'll see how people in both neighborhoods are staking claim to the other's territory. A large number of readers think Boystown goes right up to Wrigley Field and several Wrigleyville residents think their neighborhood goes right up to Halsted.
I love stuff like this.
The weather in Chicago cleared up enough that we got a great view of the total lunar eclipse last night:
For comparison, here is the full moon when Earth doesn't get in the way:
Note that it's a lot harder to photograph the moon when it's eclipsed. The full moon reflects 9% of the light falling on it, or about half as much as a standard gray card or green grass. So when shooting the moon, the correct exposure is surprisingly fast: about 1/250 at f/5.6 at ISO 100. Shooting the eclipse last night, I used 1/10 at f/5.6 at ISO-25600. And a tripod.
Yesterday I ate a quantity of food that I think only Ribfest has ever surpassed, but it was spread out over six very sunny hours. Today I'm recovering. Probably more interesting blog entries and a photo or two tomorrow.
WGN's Tom Skilling is optimistic about seeing Sunday night's eclipse:
While the first vestiges of Sunday evening’s full moon will begin at 7:40pm, the partial eclipse stage is to be reached at 8:07 pm Chicago time moving toward the “total eclipse” phase at 9:11pm. The disc of the moon will take on a dim rusty-red cast in the total eclipse phase for 1 hour and 12 minutes (through 10:23pm Sunday evening). The partial eclipse phase is to be reached at 11:27 pm and the eclipse ends at 11:55 pm.
The early read is that the weather is going to cooperate in viewing the event from Chicago and the Midwest. Here, from the National Weather Service’s GFS forecast model is a forecast of the likely location of cloud cover at differing heights–and, finally, a composite of potential total cloud cover at 7pm CDT Sunday.
Here is the GFS model’s total cloud cover prediction. Sunday is likely to be an unseasonably mild late September day with brisk southerly winds likely to boost daytime temps across the VChicago area to around 80-degrees and to limit nighttime lows to the 60s.
Here's hoping. It should be an epic eclipse.
It's a little warmer today than it was yesterday in Chicago, but it's still gorgeous. Here's the river yesterday afternoon:
I'm glad I took that walk, because I actually had some trouble getting steps with my schedule yesterday. Today, not as much of a problem—and also several degrees warmer. My office right now is north of 26°C. Opening a window hasn't helped much as the wind is blowing out.
Back to the mines anyway...
I'm camped in a familiar spot, SFO Terminal 2, on my way home. Traveling Saturday morning means no traffic, no lines at security, and sometimes no sleep. That fortunately isn't a problem today; in fact, had I gotten up half an hour earlier, I might have made the 8am flight home instead of the 9:15 I'm on.
Longtime reader MJG just sent me this to pass the time waiting for my flight to board:
If you live in the Midwest, NOAA has a fact sheet.
Saw this about two hours ago in my neighborhood. Can anyone identify the species?
She was about 70 mm across, with a 25 mm body. Not something I'd want to discover in my kitchen.