Author: admincatsg

I know it’s been a while. A lot has happened. I won’t get into much of it.

But we have had some rain. Yesterday we even had an eclipse, a total solar eclipse. That was interesting. If you’ve never seen one, words can describe it but they can’t fully describe the experience. And you need to experience one to understand what it really is like.

One interesting part of yesterday’s eclipse was we did have some clouds. Not a lot, and they broke up enough to get the full experience of the eclipse. They had forecast rain, and we did get rain. The eclipse totality was around 1:37 pm and the rain began just a bit after sundown. As I write this its almost 9pm the next day. We got about 1/2″ of rain last night, but I didn’t stay up late enough lot the actual amount. This morning when I got up we had 0.34 inches of rain. As of now, almost 9pm we have over 3″ of rain and it is still raining.

We had rain, lightning, thunder, and I understand some areas got hail. And more of the same is on tap for more. We’ve been under severe thunderstorm warnings, for a while we were under tornado watch. They have had a lot of warnings about lightning. Here where I live we’ve had some close strikes. Normally my dog doesn’t care about thunder. But both last night and today we’ve had such thunder even my dog has taken notice.

Unfortunately we won’t be out of these storms until tomorrow sometime. The forecast says we’ll have them until late morning. We’ll see how long the storms last.

The good news is that we are getting rain, and quite a bit of rain. Like I said, we’re already at over 3 inches of rain, just today. I’m sure it will help all the lakes, and the aquifers. Texas does need all of those filled, both lakes and aquifers. Those are often our primary water sources.

UPDATE: It’s not quite 9:30 pm and we’ve now got 5.26″ of rain

Update: the last total last night that I saw was 5.41″ of rain.

Yes, we have a significant weather change. Today reached the low 70’s. It was sunny, and lovely outside. It made for nice walks. What a difference a day makes.

Now as for that fire that is still ongoing in Texas. Now they are saying it started on Monday. And it may have started by a downed power pole. Is that the actual cause, to be determined.

But the worry now is warm weather and wind are on their way for the weekend. How bad will it get? We don’t know. I will keep you posted.

Yup, it it still cold. At 4:30 pm it was 43 degrees outside and a bit on the wet side too. It is not a pouring down rain. It is more like a drizzly, damp, just wet enough to get the roads slick kind of rain. But to put it in perspective, the rain in my back yard only measures 0.01 inches of rain. That is almost no rain, almost.

But tomorrow… tomorrow we should be in the 70’s, and the day after in the 80’s.

Welcome to Texas spring time weather.

To add to the fun, the Panhandle area of Texas is in wildfires. Yet part of the area had snow. One of Reagan’s relatives said they had 2″ of snow. Yet outside Amarillo over 1 million acres have burned. It’s called the Smokehouse fire. It ranges from north of Amarillo in a place called Fritch, east thru an area called Canadian all the way to the Oklahoma border, and slightly into OK. And the fire started yesterday. The panhandle area has had to deal with dry air and wind. The fire is more scrub grass wildfire. Its not an area with a lot of trees, but anything in the path is burning. Houses have gone up in smoke, ranch land has burned. Even some cattle have died due to the fire.

As of today, this evening, they say only 3% of the fire is contained. Basically, its not contained at all. Hopefully conditions will change and they’ll be able to contain it.

It is also now the largest wildfire in Texas history.

The cold front came in. It’s now 4:30 and we’ve only made it to 51 here at the house. That’s a bit cold considering what we were at yesterday. And the breeze, okay sometimes it has been a wind, makes it feel even colder. Tomorrow is supposed to be cold again, with even a possibility of rain. And yet in two days we should be back to 80 degrees. Yes this is central Texas spring time weather. It just doesn’t know what it wants to do. We just have to keep both winter clothes and summer clothes available.

Tonight is supposed to be colder, hitting about 40 degrees. Yet tomorrow night should be even colder, mid 30’s. What is crazy is it appears there are small patches of Texas sitting around freezing, and possibly getting precipitation. I’m not going to say they are getting snow or ice, because I don’t know that. But it is rather strange weather.

Note: I had to walk my dog. With the breeze and the cold I walked him in a down jacket. It is cold out there.

Here at the house we did not hit 90. We only made it to 86, but that’ pretty warm for February. Wednesday is still forecast for mid 50’s.

Where I didn’t get to 90, apparently some areas west of where I am got into the 90’s. I heard on the news that parts of Killeen, not that far away got to 93. Actually Killeen had an interesting weather pattern. Part of it only got to about 86, and part of it got to 93 (maybe higher, I’m not sure). The news said somewhere got to 97 in its viewing area.

Now, what should we be at? We should only be around 65 this time of year. That’s a bit of a difference from where we got to. We’ll see how tomorrow’s weather goes.

Yup, it is warm today. We are talking in the high 70’s, and possibly even low 80’s. Online weather says it is 84, I’m not sure where that is being measured. Its just after noon and here at my place the weather station says it is 82. Okay, yup it is warm. And this is Texas February weather. Temperatures are once again all over the place.

Last weekend I had a fire in the fireplace. But now, well here we are – warm and sunny. Do remember to wear sunscreen. Next week they think we’ll have a cold front that will take us back into the 60’s for high temperatures. We’ll see what happens. We haven’t really had much rain. It would be nice if we get some.

I have been looking at making some minor changes to outside. I don’t know that I will start a garden, but I have added some pots with caladiums, put in flower seeds, and turned my yard rain water back on. Actually Reagan had to come help me with turning the water back on. I didn’t know how to. I looked online how to turn it on, but didn’t quite understand which things to turn on. Part of the problem was that the online systems looked different than what I have, and seemed to expect you to know what they were talking about. I don’t think I will have the lines blown out again.

Elsewhere areas have their own problems. Unfortunately California has still been having rain issues. It looks like they have a clear day today, but they have had flooding. Weather is changing from what it once was.

Today is the first of February and what a change in weather. We’ve changed from the cold we had the other week to beautiful nice warm more mid to late spring type of weather. By that I mean its been beautiful outside. We’ve been mid 60’s to low 70’s. I think one day even hit 76 at the high. This morning by 11AM it was already 64 outside. So when I say its been nice I need it. The weather has been great.

But will it last? Is winter over for us? That I don’t know. The last freeze date for here is mid March, like March 22. So we could still be in for another 6 weeks with cold hitting at some odd ball time. Then again, the cold could be done for. Who knows?

But it is nice. I was able to get a company in to raise the canopy of my oaks in front, and have them clean them up. The oaks had taken some damage at one time. There was a place where a branch had obviously been torn off in some weather incident. So I was glad to have someone come in and take out branches that didn’t need to be there. Some were crossing branches that were growing together, some were just extra branches, think side heavy. So I needed someone that could handle that for me. I also had them treat the trees for their health. But the trees look much better.

But next year I will probably need to have them work on the trees again. Even the company said I need to let the oaks recuperate from the work they just had. So be it.

With the nice weather I have begun doing a little work on the yard. I’ve reseeded dirt patches, looked at putting in some pavers in front, bought a couple of pots and plants for them. I’m even thinking about starting some grow bags in the back yard.

One issue I have to learn about is how to turn my water back on. A couple of month ago a company came and turned off and blew out the sprinkler system. I’ve never had that done before. I guess all I have to do is literally turn the water back on and turn the watering system on and everything should work. I just hope that’s true. We’ll find out. New things I get to learn.

And of course we’ll see what the weather does and when I should turn the watering system back on.

So far so good. We got some rain. They still say more is on its way. But by noon today here at my place I have 3.56 inches of rain. I sure hope my weather station is correct. But its nice to get rain. We desperately need it. They do say we have more on the way tonight, and more for tomorrow. So let’s hope they are correct. We need it.

After a couple of niceish days of weather, the cold came roaring back. We didn’t have much of great weather, it didn’t last long. But last night we got back down to low 20’s. This morning, it is still in the mid 20’s, like 27. With any luck we’ll get into the 40’s, even if only just barely today. But tonight should be back down to freezing. Tomorrow is not much better. It may not even make it to 40 tomorrow. But at least it also shouldn’t get below freezing tomorrow night either. So that should hopefully be better weather.

As for next week, starting Monday they say rain. The forecast is 95% chance of rain. I watched the news yesterday and they said possibly 2inches of rain from the storms that will be coming in. If their predictions hold any truth, we could get rain Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, maybe a break Thursday, then possible rain next Friday. That would do us some good.

In addition, the weather will warm up. Monday may be in the 50’s, with Tuesday in the 60’s. At least that means it will be a warmer rain, not rain and 40 degrees – that’s a cold rain.

But it means here we may have a warm couple of weeks. Other parts of the country have been dealing with more ice, snow, and cold than we have. There was an article in the news about a football game in an open stadium. It was so cold fans were treated for hypothermia and frostbite. With the changes in weather that have been occurring, both cold and heat, you have to wonder how wise open stadiums are. At one time, maybe they were okay. But now with how weather has changed, I’m not so sure what will happen with open stadium.

Its easy to say people should bundle up and dress for the weather. But there is always the possibility of someone that thought they were prepared for the cold but underestimated what it could do to them. Its not lack of preparation, but maybe lack of experience. Things to think about.