Rain, Showers, Drizzle, Mist, Sunbreaks

October had a lot of clear days, but it appears the rains have begun.



As a native Seattleite, I can offer some predictions about weather during the rest of the school year:

• There will be many cloudy days.
• It will rain at some point during many of them.
• It won't usually rain buckets -- just drips and drizzles.
• We might get a little snow. (If so, traffic will be a mess. Think about it: we've got lots of hills and darn few snow plows.)
• There will probably be several sunny days in February.
• We will have cherry blossoms, crocuses, daffodils, and tulips when your friends and relatives in the East and Midwest are still looking at leafless trees and piles of dirty snow. It will still rain often, but the flowers are nice. And you don't have to shovel rain.
  

Of course, I have no training in meteorology. If you'd like to learn about the weather from someone who does, see Cliff Mass Weather Blog. Mass is on the faculty of the UW's Department of Atmospheric Sciences. His book, The Weather of the Pacific Northwest was just published.

For a book that combines some of the science of weather with anecdotes and quotations from historical and literary figures (Capt. Vancouver, John Steinbeck, Raymond Carver, and more), see David Laskin, Rains All the Time: A Connoisseur's History of Weather in the Pacific Northwest (1997).

Laskin's book is available through Summit. Mass's is so new that it's still being processed at several Summit libraries.

Photo from the Washington State Department of Transportation camera overlooking I-5 at Lake City Way this afternoon.