Great Picture! I like the sign. I have never lived anywhere else in Alaska, but Seward... 32 years now! I don't know if I could adjust to the bleaker landscape of the northern country. I suppose whatever one becomes used to is beautiful and dear. We have some deer in this area... not reindeer. They are mostly out on Montegue Island. Hunter go out there in the fall. They are small deer, more like goats, so the limit is more than one, I believe. Our weather being what it is, hunters are often flown in, then picked up later... sometimes much later than they would have liked. On occasion, they've consumed a good deal of their deer before they get home!
When I lived in northern Indiana, we had hot, humid summers. Even having been raised there, I never got used to it. Clothes stick to you, crackers are stale as soon as you open them... it is like walking through warm pudding. Surprisingly, as much rain as we have here on the coast, it is not humid... I suppose we don't get hot enough for humidity. Even in summer, a bag of potato chips don't become stale if left open all night. We have been experiencing some strange spring weather here for the two or three summers preceding the last. The temps shot up into the 80's, and we were all walking around in shorts, complaining about the heat. Ordinarily, our spring weather is rather mild. Of course, shortly after the hot weather, we returned to chilly weather and a couple frosts that left my potted plants on tabletops covered in frost.
Why the West has been sweltering in a greenhouse
Carol your description of a hot Alaskan spring/summer without humidity and with similar temps (and cool rains) is what I remember growing up here. :) Now our spring/summer is becoming more like your description of Indiana's. :(
In July of 2005 our actual temperature reading was 82.4 degrees F. But with the humidity, and our longer northern summer daylight hours, the "feels like" temperature was 114.8 degrees Fahrenheit. I didn't capture the pic below when it was over Saskatchewan but I did when it was over Manitoba. The only place in North America that had the same temps/humidity that day was Savannah, Georgia. Can you imagine how high the "feels like" could get if our actual temperature reading was 114°F (1937) and we have the same high amount of humidity? (The humidity reading that day was 100 % and it wasn't raining). Thank goodness the system eventually moved on (and with it I imagine the greenhouse gases that were trapping the humidity) and it did rain and the temperatures did drop down and we finally had a short reprieve (Eastern Canada wasn't happy though).
This message was edited Mar 6, 2007 5:56 PM
Of all the things I can recall with fondness of my early years in the midwest, hot humid weather is definitely not one of them. Having grown fat and suffered the effects of gravity, I have too many lumps and folds to simmer away in the heat. If it becomes that hot here, I will have to live in the basement.
LOL ah trust me we all will. ;) I've nearly gone out of my mind with some of the previous summers heat that we experienced and have seriously eyed our old unfinished, somewhat creepy basement (house was built in 1911) or a tent, or the car with the A/C running. Our house is without A/C but when we reach temps around the 100's so is my workplace. The chillers there can't handle the high temps/humidity and they break down. Moose Jaw Public Library closed it's doors to the public, July 24, 2006, for the first time in it's 90+ history (and then we wait 2-3 weeks for the parts to be shipped from Montreal). Most patrons understood why (they'd been in the building) but a few that were locked out wrote nasty letters to the local newspaper. They didn't realize that the humidity had built up inside and it was at least 12 dripping degrees warmer inside the building then it was outside (the humidity was nowhere near 100% that week). The day before we closed down Margaret Atwood (a famous Canadian author) was in the building for Festival of Words: http://www.festivalofwords.com/ The library's lecture theatre had 100 % attendance, no A/C, and poor Margaret was extremely heat stressed.
We've got to do all in our power to lower the humidity (ie: keep the moisture in the ground). I really do pray that the owner of Virgin Airlines and NASA can figure out some way of capturing emissions.
This message was edited Mar 7, 2007 12:10 AM
Oh, dear, Lilypon, in the name of cultural endeavor, get the humidity and temperature in check, or you'll never see another celebrity in Moose Jaw!
LOLOL I must admit Ms Atwood stood out in my memory ;) (c'mon we are a small town and the Festival of Words executive did darn good).........but she's in her 70's and looking at her we realized how dangerous those high temperatures could be to the elderly. When it gets that hot out many that don't have A/C come to the library. We dug out our Archives meter that read the humidity, a thermometer, and then went on line to find an occupation health chart that showed we were at the end of the temperature range of heat exhaustion and the next level was where heat stroke could be imminent.
This message was edited Mar 7, 2007 11:04 AM
If Seward were to become hot and dry, we would be a great dust bowl. Even a couple weeks of dry weather is frightening here.
that great dust bowl is what strikes fear in every prairie peeps heart. The drought we are in now is worse than the dirty thirties but because of better farming practices it doesn't look as bad.
I went to the weather forum and lifted what I posted on March 1.......that humidity reading is sickening. :( edited to say the snow that was falling was the *dry* snow (little tiny snowflakes).
Lilypon
Moose Jaw, SK (Canada)
(Zone 3b)
Mar 1, 2007
8:06 AM
Post #3236928
10 °F / -12 °C
Light Snow
Humidity: 92%
Dew Point: 9 °F / -13 °C
Wind: 13 mph / 20 km/h / 5.7 m/s from the NW
Pressure: 29.86 in / 1011 hPa
Windchill: -5 °F / -20 °C
++++++++++++++++++++++++
Alberta's response the our rather steamy situation:
Saturday, August 4, 2007
Stelmach to premiers: Don’t mess with :b Alberta q:
Moncton summit won't change province's approach to climate change, he says
Jason Markusoff, CanWest News Service
Published: Friday, August 03, 2007
EDMONTON — Premier Ed Stelmach warned his fellow Canadian premiers that Alberta will not toughen its climate-change approach, no matter what new national strategies other provincial leaders may propose at next week’s premiers’ summit in New Brunswick.
He reiterated past statements that any movements towards a system of hard caps on greenhouse-gas emissions or a cross-Canada trading market for pollution credits would likely send dollars or jobs out of the country’s most petroleum-rich province.
“The message is very clear: Don’t mess with Alberta. Alberta’s boom is Canada’s boom,” Stelmach told a news conference today.
Climate-change issues are expected to dominate the agenda at the three-day conference in Moncton, as they have at other recent premiers’ gatherings. Stelmach said he intends to position Alberta as the leader on this front, boasting the first provincial limits on large industrial emissions.
However, Alberta’s legislation only forces its energy sector to reduce the intensity of its carbon-dioxide output per barrel, not overall — a regime that critics inside and outside of Alberta have condemned as an insufficient to help prevent global warming from harmfully altering the planet, and well below Canada’s targets under the Kyoto accord on climate change.
Ontario Premier Dalton McGuinty has led the push for a national emissions-trading network, but Stelmach has panned the idea several times before, including at a one-day premiers’ summit in Toronto in May. He argued that corporate dollars to offset pollution should stay in Alberta and help develop new environmental-cleanup technologies.
Stelmach has also rebuffed an invitation from British Columbia for cross-province trading of green credits.
NDP Leader Brian Mason said Stelmach seems to be heading to Moncton with a “chip on his shoulder.” He argued that Alberta’s current green plan pays mere lip service to address the heavy pollution from its oilsands and coal-power generators, and the rest of Canada is right to be concerned.
This will be the rookie premier’s first Council of the Federation meeting, although Stelmach attended one as former premier Ralph Klein’s intergovernmental relations minister.
He also said he plans to keep pushing other provinces to join the interprovincial trade accord British Columbia and Alberta have inked, arguing that conflicting provincial regulations obstruct cross-Canada economic growth.
But he remained steadfastly opposed to the creation of a national securities regulator, which Federal Finance Minister Jim Flaherty and many top Canadian executives say is necessary to properly oversee the country’s financial markets.
© CanWest News Service 2007
This message was edited Aug 4, 2007 3:12 PM
It's hard to imagine 92% humidity when it is that cold!
Lilypon I'll dmail you about the 'elderlies'. Humph or huff as they say in Norway.