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Superstitions, Friday the 13th, Triakaidekaphobia, Father’s Day

All the best this weekend to our fathers. Your day  was the idea of Sonora  Dodd of Spokane, Washington. Sonora, one of 6 children, wanted to pay tribute to her father, who after the death of her mother, raised Sonora and her five siblings on his own.

After listening to a sermon on Mother’s day in 1910, Sonora approached the speaker in regards to a similar holiday that would honor fathers. On June 6, 1910, during the meeting of local ministers at Spokane’s YMCA building, Mrs. Dodd presented a petition that requested the third Sunday be set aside as a national  Father’s Day. The ministers endorsed the petition, and soon it gained the attention of many national figures including President Woodrow Wilson. In 1914 Congress endorsed Father’s Day. Finally,  in 1971, a proclamation by President Richard Nixon established Father’s Day as an annual national observance.

How do you feel about the number 13?? Like it or not, today is Friday the 13th. A fear of the number thirteen is called triskaidekaphobia. Fear of Friday the 13th is referred to as paraskevidekatriaphobia. Whatever you call it or however you pronounce it, there are many superstitious types who dread 13. Have you ever sat at a table that held 13? Do any towns have a thirteenth street? Most buildings eliminate the 13th floor. Few communities have a house number 13.

The Greek word triakaidekaphobia means tris = three, kia = and, deka = ten. In ancient Rome there was a Thirteenth Club that defied the superstition by holding dinner for 13 members on the 13th of each month. There are a number of theories about how the fear of 13 started. One reason is that the standard fee for a hangman was 13 pence.

President Franklin Roosevelt would often invite his assistant, Grace Tully, to a lunch or dinner, if last minute changes resulted in only thirteen guests. Roosevelt wasn’t superstitious but he felt others might be. So, are you superstitious or do you throw caution to the wind on Friday the 13th?? Try out your luck today

by pgeiger
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Have you ever heard the saying “Sleep Tight, don’t let the bed bugs bite.”  In the early days f the Us, only the wealthy had mattresses. Most folks had to sleep on straw that was put inside sheets. And, each night the bedding might sag a little. So before going to bed, one would retie the ropes to hold the bedding in place and hope that the critters (bedbugs) would not come out and bite. Thus, the saying was true.

A couple years ago, the media started picking up on the fact that people were experiencing bed bug bites particularly if you travel and sleep in a motel. Personally, I have never had the pleasure (bugs in beds) but it is a problem and one that is growing. Bugs find their way into a mattress and when you go to sleep at night, they gravitate toward the warm body and then take a bite or two or three. If you have been bitten, you will awake with small red marks and  that itchy feeling.

So, if you need a mattress for a camp and go to a garage sale, be sure it is clean. Bedbugs are blood sucking insects that hide in a mattress, box springs, headboards, furniture and even in clothing. A sign of bedbugs is the look of pepper on a mattress or sheets - the remains of blood from previous victims. The bugs are about 3/16th of an inch long with six legs.

What to do:

Hotel rooms - inspect them carefully upon arrival. Look for this pepper appearance, check seams and headboard cracks.

Travel clothes - when you get home from a trip, wash your clothes - hot water does the trick.

Second hand furniture - check it closely before bringing  into the house.

I know when I check into a hotel, I always check for bugs… even at upscale places. If you find bugs in a hotel room, report it to the manager. If you have bedbugs at home, you may need to get a professional to spray. But, if you are careful about used mattresses and furniture you may never run into one of these critters. Yet another thing to worry about. Sorry

by pgeiger
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I am beginning to see an interesting trend resulting from rough winters. Here is a great question form Montreal, Canada:

Rumors on the streets say that Montreal is expecting another 90 centimeters of snow in the coming weeks…this is, what I am told, the Farmers’ Almanac is reporting… Can you confirm any of these myths?

My response…. if you are going to receive another 90 centimeters, it is not because the Farmers’ Almanac says so. Feel free to go to my website and click on weather and Canada. Then see what we are predicting for the next two months. Last year Denver (Colorado) had major storms all winter and as we got to the end of the season rumors were heard on the streets indicating the Farmers’ Almanac was calling for a storm with 30 inches (76 cm) of snow, then 40 inches (101 cm) and finally a storm with 55 inches (140 cm) of snow. The snowball (storm) got bigger with time. I finally got on Denver media to dispel the rumor.

This has been a rough winter to say the least in many northern US and Canadian regions and we do call for rain/ snow all for the balance of March. But, check out our web and follow what the publication calls for. Of course I don’t make the snow and anything is possible. But, let’s hope the worst is behind us!! At least that is what we believe.

The trend - if there is a tough winter with incredible amounts of snow, a rumor gets started that according to the Farmers’ Almanac, the “big one” will hit at the end. In the case of Denver, it didn’t and I don’t think my Canadian friend are going to get 90 cm. When in doubt, check out our two months of predictions for regions of the US and Canada.

by pgeiger
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Last week I mentioned how March can bring out the worst in the weather. Let’s add the tornado in Atlanta to that list. In terms of tornado frequency among the states, Georgia is in the middle. It’s not near the top of the list (as is Kansas and Oklahoma, which are in “Tornado Alley”) but it’s not down near the bottom of the list (like Alaska or Washington State).

The greatest threat of a tornado would be in April or May, so Friday’s event is a little unusual. It is even more unusual to have a tornado appear within a major city is extremely uncommon. The last major city to catch a tornado was salt Lake City on August 11, 1999. Having appeared on CNN in Atlanta several times, it is amazing that there wasn’t more damage to this part of town. Thank God. And, no we did not say tornadoes for our predictions - just windy and rain. We are cheering for any rain in the Southeast but the kinder and gentler type is preferred.

This is Flood Awareness Week in New England and elsewhere. Here are some terms ( form the National Weather Service) to remember:

Flood Warnings for major rivers - these warnings are issued specifically for major rivers and include forecasts of water levels and/ or flows at certain points along the river.

Flood Warnings for small rivers and streams - These warnings are issued by your local county for smaller rivers and streams.

Flash Flood Warnings - These are issued for rivers and streams in a specific area when rapid rises are expected to cause flooding and immediate action may be needed to save lives or protect property.

Urban Flood Advisories - these advisories are issued for urban areas or small streams when the normal drainage is unable to handle the volume of runoff from the heavy rain and/ or snowmelt.

Obviously, not all parts of the US and Canada are facing flood problems. But, there are significant areas that have had high moisture content snow and the closer we get to April and quick warming, the greater the potential for minor or major flooding. We had very similar conditions in March of 1987 which led to massive floods in Northern New England.

Be prepared.

by pgeiger
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John Jensenius is a long time friend with the National Weather Service. He reminds me that the week of March 17th is Flood Awareness Week for New England. It is true for other parts of the country as well. Floods kill 74 people annually, so preparing for a flood is best done in advance before anything begins to happen. You don’t have to live in a flood zone to feel the impact of heavy snow and rain.

In advance:

> Check your insurance policy to see where you stand regarding coverage,

> Be sure to keep any drains open and free from ice, leaves and dirt.

> remove snow close to your foundation.

If a flood is imminent:

> Keep valuables on the top floor or move to another property.

> Have an evacuation plan should waters rise quickly.

> Unplug electrical equipment.

> Turn off utilities (gas and electric)

Finally:

> Don’t walk into moving water. Only 6 inches can knock you down or move a car along.

> Six inches of water is enough to come up to the bottom of a car’s door. Don’t feel overly empowered in a truck or SUV. They can float away just as easily.

> Don’t wait for an “official flood warning”. If you think it might happen, go to high grounds.

Almost half of flood deaths occur in vehicles. Driving through running water is dangerous. If your car is swept into raging water, stay calm. Wait for the car to fill with water. Once it fills the doors will open and you can swim to the surface. If you cannot exit the water, cling to a tree or bush until rescuers can get to you.

Remaining calm is your best defense. Let’s hope the Spring brings with it slow melting.

by pgeiger
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With all the news coverage of snow and ice, I thought this was an interesting letter.

Everyone always predicts snow everywhere in the U.S with the exception of the one place that always would like to see snow and that is northern Louisiana. Why is it that the weather conditions are never good enough for it to snow here? My grandchildren may never know what snow looks like. Can I put a request in for snow?

Juanita from Louisiana.

Juanita,

Requests (for snow) are happily taken but remember I am merely the messenger…. not the snow maker. I think your grandchildren are in the wrong place.I don’t know exactly where you live but Shreveport, La. gets 1.5 inches of snow per year (on average over the last 50 winters). My first suggestion is to move the clan to Maine. We just got hit with 12 inches of snow on top of three earlier storms. Our lakes are frozen solid and the wind chill is sub zero. Another suggestion is to plan a vacation to this winter wonderland. Then you can take winter and snow in small doses.

You might be careful about what you wish for. If I had it in my power, I’d give you lots of snow but Colorado, the Great Lakes and many parts of the Midwest and Northeast are having all the snow and associated fun one can ask for. While it may not snow in your backyard there are lots of places to go.

On a side note. If you watched pro football yesterday, several stadiums were buried in snow. So, there is plenty out there and more coming. The Farmers’ Almanac even calls for a Christmas Day snow in some parts of the US. Check it out. This is proving to be a winter of contrasts. We are seeing warmer conditions it the South but plenty of action elsewhere.

Also, if you haven’t watched our video “Yes, Virginia, There Is A Santa”, I encourage you to do so and to share with friends. It puts you in the Spirit of the Holidays and can be found on our home page.

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snow, weather conditions, winter, Farmers’ Almanac

by pgeiger
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The US weather map is in a real state of flux. Warm conditions in the South but winter in the Plains and Northeast. I a woke to 0 degrees this morning and no heat wave in sight. The Midwest is experiencing ice conditions that remind me of the Great Northeast Ice Storm of 1998 that knocked out power to 75% of Maine residents for up to 14 days. So, here is some insights into what, where and why of ice.

So, What Is Ice?

Simply defined, ice is the solid form of water. Water freezes at 32° Fahrenheit (0° Celsius). But ice won¹t form on its own between 32°F and -40°F. Liquid water and water vapor need specks of dust, dirt, or other debris to serve as a nucleus around which the hexagonal (six-sided) crystals of ice can form. This is why water droplets can be ³supercooled² and remain liquid below 32°F.

Types of Icy Weather

Icy weather can occur in many forms; as snow, sleet, hail, or freezing rain. Ice can deposit on objects as hoar frost, rime, or glaze. Ice fog, or freezing fog, is yet another type ice.

Snow

Snow forms when water vapor in a cloud condenses and creates crystals of ice. Snowflakes can be made up of just one crystal or of many crystals. When the ice crystals grow to be heavier than air, they fall to earth. The largest snowflakes on record occurred during a snowstorm on January 28, 1887, in Ft. Keough, Montana where snowflakes 15 inches in diameter were observed!

Snowflakes, like their parent ice crystals, are six-sided. The beauty, diversity, and complexity of snowflakes are breathtaking.

Sleet and Hail

The biggest confusion people have, when it comes to icy weather, is between hail and sleet, says Matt Noyes, a good friend and meteorologist with New England Cable News (NECN). Hail tends to be observed during the summertime, and occurs during a thunderstorm. A hailstone is basically a ball of layered ice, very much like an onion. If you were to cut a hailstone open you¹d see layers inside much like you’d see if you cut open an onion.

Strong winds lift raindrops upwards, where they freeze, attract more moisture and become ice pellets. This process continues as the pellets come into contact with more raindrops and eventually the ball of ice becomes heavier than the wind can support: that’s when you have a hailstone that finally falls to the ground.

A sleet pellet and notice that instead of a “hail-stone”usually falls during the wintertime. Sleet occurs in the winter when there¹s a warm layer of air above a freezing layer near the ground.

Freezing Rain

Freezing rain is just rain that freezes on contact.

Basically, it¹s warm above your head it may even be warm 10 feet off the ground but the ground temperature is below freezing. You get regular raindrops that fall from the sky, but when they hit the very cold ground, they freeze on contact. Sometimes with freezing rain, the air temperature can be above freezing, but if the ground itself is below freezing, the rain still freezes on contact‹on objects like power lines and tree limbs.² The smooth, icy glaze formed by freezing rain coats trees, bushes, fences, telephone wires, and streets. It¹s beautiful to look at, but it can break tree limbs, down power lines, and create treacherous roads.

Glaze

Glaze is an accumulation of freezing rain. If you have freezing rain that falls long enough, you end up accumulating a glaze on cold surfaces.

Glaze is a smooth, clear, mostly transparent ice that forms as a frozen film on objects. It¹s usually less than an inch thick, but can be much thicker; an ice storm in January 1961 encased wires in northern Idaho in eight inches of glaze.

Ice Storms

Meteorologists issue an ice storm warning if a coating of ice a half inch thick or more is expected. That’s because once the ice builds up that much, there¹s enough stress on wires and tree branches to actually break them. There¹s enough weight from the ice that it can cause things to collapse and you can have structural damage.

While ice storms are most commonly caused by freezing rain, they can also be caused by sleet. Sometimes we see a sleet storm in which the sleet, because it¹s basically ice pellets, collects on the ground almost like balls of ice.That¹s why we see problems with road conditions not only from freezing rain causing a glaze, but also from sleet.

As we are seeing into he Midwest, ice storms can be among the most dangerous and disruptive of storms. Glaze on wires causes electrical, telephone, and cable TV outages. Slip-and-fall injuries are common due to icy steps and sidewalks. Driving is especially hazardous over 85 percent of the fatalities in ice storms result from traffic accidents.

One of the worst ice storms in recent memory took place in 1998, with devastating effects in Quebec, Ontario and New Brunswick, Canada, and the northeastern U.S. The storm caused 56 deaths, primarily from hypothermia or carbon monoxide poisoning, and damages of more than $5.4 billion. Over 4.5 million Canadians were without power, as were 56,000 New Hampshire residents and 80 percent of Maine¹s residents. In places, it took more than three weeks to restore the electricity. In Montreal, traffic lights were out, the subway system closed, and radio and television stations had no broadcast signals. The storm that has blanketed the Midwest will certainly rival the ‘98 storm in terms of intensity and damage.

Ice fog and freezing fog

Fog occurs when clouds form near the ground. Clouds are usually made up of water droplets, but they can also be made of ice crystals, if it¹s very cold. Ice fog forms when droplets of water freeze into ice crystals in midair.

Rime and Hoar Frost

Rime is the often sugary-looking ice that forms on objects as the result of a freezing fog, a phenomenon that regularly occurs on mountaintops. The Mount Washington Observatory in New Hampshire, known as the ³Home of the world¹s worst weather,² has spectacular formations of rime ice, or ³frozen fog,² since freezing fog frequently cloaks the summit. Super cooled water droplets in clouds create the feathery rime‹up to a foot an hour‹on the windward sides of buildings and weather instruments.

How can you see rime ice without taking a snow tractor to the top of Mount Washington? Look for rime formations along the banks of rivers‹on tree branches, for example, as fog often occurs above rivers.

Hoar frost is the ice that grows on solid surfaces from the water vapor in air. If it¹s freezing outside and warm inside, water vapor on a windowpane sublimes directly into ice, forming frost. Frost differs from rime and glaze in that frost develops from the vapor, or gas, phase into a solid (sublimation), and never goes through the liquid phase (condensation). Rime condenses to the liquid phase before it freezes.

Since objects may be colder than the air, frost may appear even when the temperature outside is above freezing.

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ice storms, freezing rain, sleet , glaze, Farmers’ Almanac

by pgeiger
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My heart goes out to the folks in the Northwest. Natural disasters are never easy to handle but floods are particularly unforgiving and the long term recovery is difficult. In a perfect world we’d have just enough rain to handle our needs but that isn’t the case as we can see throughout the US and Canada. How much is enough rain anyway?

A week ago, parts of the drought ravaged South received an inch of rain. the media “complained” that it didn’t help replace the lost water. But, how much is an inch of rain??

An acre of ground contains 43,560 square feet. Consequently, a rainfall of 1 inch over 1 acre of ground could mean a total of 6,272,640 cubic inches of water. This is the equivalent of 3,630 cubic feet.

As a cubic foot of pure water weighs about 62.4 pounds, it follows that the weight of a uniform coating of 1 inch of rain over 1 acre of surface would be 226,512 pounds or about 113 short tons.The weight of 1 U.S. gallon of pure water is about 8.345 pounds. Consequently, a rainfall of 1 inch over 1acre of ground would mean 27,143 gallons of water.

So, an inch of water over an acre is a lot and spread out over the entire South it is rather significant. There is still tremendous need for water in the ground but it happens 1 inch at a time. Our next call for rain in the South is December 12 - 13th. And for the winter we think it will be “cold and wet”.

We have experienced a delay in getting the January 2008 weather updated on our website. It will be corrected before the sun sets today - our apologies.

Here is one photo of Robbie and Sam of Wayne, Maine. They were eager to shovel the first snow of the winter. We’ll see if they jump on shoveling duties when they turn 15. Winter arrived and we are hoping that it will be “White” for most places on Christmas Day.

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drought, natural disasters, an inch of rain equals, Farmers’ Almanac

by pgeiger
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Over the weekend one national network news reported on the rather dull foliage colors this year. Before it was over global warming was ending all future colors as we know it. Maybe? I’ll be the first to admit that we had a “disappointing” foliage in New England but I blame the drier conditions and lack of a sustained cold spell. We stick have an array of colors but compared the the best years…. it just isn’t. It has dipped into the 30s and there has been snow in the mountains. But, for the vibrant colors we need two things. The first is plenty of rain during the summer and the other is cold.

Colors come out when the chlorophyll that provides the green (the dominant color) all summer starts to break down. This happens when we have shorter days and cooler nights which tells the trees to shut off the flow of nutrients to their leaves. We have not had the usual cold night temperatures to make this happen and in some cases the leaves are dropping with changing color.

We have a foliage guide in the 2008 Farmers’ Almanac - best viewing times for all regions of the country. If you have a photo of your foliage, send it along. While it has been less vibrant , there is still some good viewing.

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foliage, global warming, temperatures, best viewing times

by pgeiger
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The country is in a buzz about the National Weather Service’s winter weather prediction. I have had a few messages on what now.

Hello– Considering today’s National Weather Service forecast calling for warm conditions in the Northeast this winter, are you still standing by your forecast calling for just the opposite? Hope so, as we are snow enthusiasts here in northern Vermont. Ron

Hi Ron: I don’t count on the National Weather Service (NWS) to make my predictions. If so, I’d just wait for them. So, I am with you in terms of wanting the snow and cold - I live in Maine. Bring it on.

Actually, our winter predictions are calling for Cold and snow East of the Mississippi River with the Great Lakes and New England getting the brunt of the snow. We believe it will be milder in the West. Caleb is a bit stubborn and hasn’t changed his or our mind about what is to come. We certainly call for snow in Colorado and the Rockies, but a good portion of the country (west of the Mississippi)will be mild according to the Farmers’ Almanac, but not everywhere and not by a long shot. While the NWS is confident about their day to day predictions, they have historically stated that they can’t go out more than 10 days with any confidence. So, I am not sure they can truly analyze an entire winter season. But, I give them credit for trying.

You can get 16 months of weather in the 2008 Farmers’ Almanac here and you can also check out our Farmers’ Almanac Winter Outlook here.

We renamed this month Pumpkintober. Check out our home page for all kinds of great pumpkin information including a Nova Scotia Giant Pumpkin Regatta broadcast on Farmers’ Almanac TV. Some people thought I was out of my gourd but it is an “earth friendly” way to enjoy nature. Plus, there is a competitive aspect of racing that I enjoy. I learned much from my Canadian experience. Click on the FATV video on the home page and picture yourself commandeering one of these decorated ships.

By the way, if you have a decorated pumpkin - painted or carved - send a photo along and we may put it on our site.

technorati tags: winter, Farmers Almanac, snow

by pgeiger
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