Rainy and dreary

Good morning Augusta Maine.

It is raining this morning, with a 100% chance of rain today. Temps will be in the 40's with light and variable winds. Its going to be sloppy out there folks, so drive accordingly.  

Tonight it will keep raining on and off with temps in the 30's. We will have light and variable winds.

The readings outside right now are:

a relative humidity of 93% with a Dew Point of 47.4ºF.

The temperature is 48.4ºF with no wind chill.

The wind velocity is presently between 0.2 mph and 7.3 mph and when it "puffs" it is out of the South Southwest.

Our Barometric pressure is 29.97 and falling.

Our rainfall has been one quarter inch in the past hour and just under one inch overnight.

Visibility is down to 2.5 miles, we have clouds to 7,500 feet with a ceiling of 10,000 feet.

More folklore tidbits for your enjoyment.

Forecasting the Seasons

Most forecasting relates to forecasting the following days weather. There are also many observations that attempt to forecast the coming seasons weather. They would appear to relate more to the farmer / shepherd than to the sailor or fisherman. The majority of the seasonal forecasting adages apply only to the northern hemisphere as the seasons in the southern hemisphere commence 6 months before (or after, which ever way you look at it).

February fog means a frost in May.

Ash Wednesday wind continues in Lent.

A cold May gives full barns and empty churchyards.

Knee high by the fourth of July.

Rain on Easter Sunday, it will rain the next 7 Sundays.

Fog in January makes a wet Spring.

Thunder in February, freeze in May.  

(Now this next one I find particularly interesting as Cisterns are not uncommon in older homes up here in Maine)

The first twelve days of January was Grandma's bible when it came to how the year was going to go. I never knew if it meant anything more than moisture. I can remember her saying we better check the cistern, cause it isn't going to rain this month. There are several times when water was hauled out, and dumped into the cistern, and grandma was right, it didn't rain.