The Art of Exploration · a diary of day trips, natural places, and miscellaneous adventures

Tag: weather

The Art of Exploration archive is where you'll find my past writings and thoughts. You are currently viewing a list of articles that were tagged in weather.

Flattop Mountain
Flattop Mountain
When I discovered that Saturday’s forecast was expected to remain clear and mild, I decide to make the most of it and to hike the Flattop Mountain Trail.
Woodcut at the Garden
Woodcut at the Garden
The weather today can only be described as wall-to-wall ICK with an occasional outbreak of YUCK and BLECH. The temperature climbed into the forties but it felt more like the twenties.
Prelude to Nemo
Prelude to Nemo
This year, The Weather Channel started naming winter storms in an attempt to grant blizzards a degree of meteorological grit previously reserved for tropical cyclones.
Snow Day
Snow Day
It snowed last night and most of today and although the total accumulation didn’t top two inches, it made everything look wonderfully white. It also screwed up traffic across the midlands.
Sunny Loughton
Sunny Loughton
One of the lovely things about Britain in January is that when the sun comes out, you’d never know it was winter. When the sun’s out, it’s like stepping into the May issue of Countryfile Magazine.
A Very Long Year
A Very Long Year
Some thoughts at the end of a very long year, and the decision to make New Year’s resolutions work for me and not to conform to fabricated social obligation that calls for drastic personal change each January.
Staying Cool
Staying Cool
The Windy City sure lived up to its name today. All day long the wind howled and puffed hefty gusts of cold air from the northwest. Cottonball clouds sped across a cobalt sky—they collided and blended together and by late afternoon the sky was leaden.
Two Storms
Two Storms
I’ve heard that in the moments before a tsunami crashes ashore, the sea rushes away from the beach. I’ve also heard that what you don’t want to do at such a time is follow the sea as it rushes out, because it’s coming back with it a bloody big wave.
Monsoons
Monsoons
The rains are here. For five days straight, I’ve lived under leaden skies and breathed in damp air. The garden is lush, which saves me the chore of watering flowerbeds twice daily.
A Hot Day in May
A Hot Day in May
It was the kind of weather that wilts flowers. The temperature climbed to ninety degrees and the air grew thick and soupy by mid-morning.
Greehouse Indulgence
Greehouse Indulgence
Today I indulged in more greenhouse escapism. It’s all an elaborate plan to avoid as much of the remaining winter as possible. Unfortunately, I’m running out of local greenhouses to visit and winter still has a firm choke-hold on the Chicago area.
November Trails
November Trails
I didn’t write much in November. In fact, I didn’t write anything until now but I did take some photographs. Although I didn’t have much to say for nearly thirty days, I now look back and realize there was plenty of beauty to speak of.
Fall Foliage
Fall Foliage
October had its chance to be the best biking month of the year. Instead, it decided to rain. It then proceeded to drizzle, pour, mist and pee down.
Middlefork Savanna
Middlefork Savanna
There are suddenly hints of fall everywhere. The morning air is dewy and condenses in the early hours of the day, forming tiny droplets on windshields and rear view mirrors.
A Real Spring
A Real Spring
It’s the Ides of March which means it’s the dead of winter back in Chicago and I’m giddy that I’m not there to (ahem) enjoy it. Instead, I’m here in Milton Keynes where March is fragrant and mild.
January Then
January Then
Just ten short days ago I thought autumn would last until March and that (further deluding myself) a mild-tempered March would give way to a sudden burst of vernal warmth.
The Rains
The Rains
Woke up early to thunderstorms that were already building. The sky broke into downpours that lasted a good hour or so and then stopped, leaving a gray sky to linger the rest of the day.
First Snow
First Snow
First last night: it snowed. Thick heavy snow, the kind that muffles sounds and makes you feel cozy and warm inside despite dropping temperatures and frosty crystals floating outside in downward spirals and mad swarms.
Weary of the Wind Chill
Weary of the Wind Chill
It’s four degrees outside. You can count them on one hand and have a thumb to spare: one, two, three, four. There is a severe lack of temperature happening outside the thin wall of my office.