Well, our "endless summer" in the Northwest has to end some time

 

If you have nothing else to talk about—well, there is, such as Donald Trump’s latest truly insane postings on his Truth Social website, and today's acquittals are hopefully the final nail in the coffin for John Durham's crumbling corpse of an investigation—you can always talk about the weather. Everyone likes to talk about the weather, especially if it’s bad weather. People are talking about the weather we’ve had in the Puget Sound area since summer de facto began in July after a wetter and cooler than normal June—in fact a wetter and cooler spring that preceded it because of La Nina.There is something just not "right."

Even the national news media has commented on it. But the La Nina effect also happened last year, and what followed the cool, wet weather was a record number of 100+ degree days. This year we didn’t see that kind of heat, but something close to it, and more of it, with a record number of 90+ degree days—and it was almost added to after a somewhat shocking day of 88 degrees this past Sunday recorded at Sea-Tac Airport, although Boeing Field, which is actually in Seattle, recorded a high of 83 degrees.

I spend a lot of time outside walking around, and what the weather is going to be like is important to know. It’s usually about precipitation, and through June we had heavier than normal rainfall, enough so that even if we didn’t see a drop through September it would still be the normal amount. Well, not only did we come pretty close to that, but the dry spell is expected to continue until October 21, when the next 10 days at least will see the first real chance of “normal” rainfall and cooler temperatures, which will probably remind these trees that summer is over too:

 

According to the weather service as measured at Sea-Tac, only .49 inches of rain has fallen since July1. The “normal” amount should be around 5 inches, which isn’t a lot of rain, since November, December and January each are expected to have at least that amount, and probably more since we are going to see a third-straight La Nina year. But it’s been so summer-like for so long that it will probably come as a “shock” to people when the rains do finally come this weekend. The soil is so dried-up it seems rock-hard, and any hard rainfall is likely to cause some serious runoff issues.

The explanation for this “endless summer” phenomenon is something called the “Rex Block” effect in which this graphic…

 

 …is explained by the Fox Weather Channel as “an atypical weather pattern that stubbornly blocks any incoming storms that usually travel on the westerly winds. It is a strong high-pressure system setting up north of an upper-level low-pressure system. This essentially cuts off the low-pressure system from the westerlies that would normally steer it.” 

We are told that until the high pressure system weakens or just decides it wants to move someplace else, the low pressure system is just going to have to wait its turn, dumping what it has on only normally bone-dry western parts of the country. It appears that move-on will begin this weekend.

But it sure was nice while it lasted, because as noted the persistent La Nina is expected to bring more of the shit winter/spring weather we’ve have had for the past two years. But come to think of it, perhaps it is righteous justice being visited upon the hypocrites of this allegedly “liberal” place; they don’t deserve what El Nino has to give them.