Warm, sunny and "Blue Moon" defined
This morning it is partly cloudy with a chance of a thunderstorm and a chance of rain in the afternoon. High of 79F. Winds less than 5 mph. Chance of rain 20%.
Tonight it will be partly cloudy with a chance of a thunderstorm and a chance of rain. Fog overnight. Low of 59F. Winds less than 5 mph. Chance of rain 20%.
The readings from my own weather instruments are:
The humidity is 84% with a Dew Point of 58ºF and a temp of 67.1ºF.
Our wind direction is East Northeast between 0.8 MPH and 1.6 MPH.
Our Barometric pressure is 30.19 HPA 1021 and rising with a weather graphic indicating sun.
The UV rating is 1 out of 16, Sunrise is at 5:37 a.m. sunset is 7:50 PM and Moon Rise is at 8:10 p.m. EDT and the moon phase is a full moon.
For the pilots out there raw metar is:
METAR KAUG 111053Z AUTO 00000KT 10SM CLR 16/14 A3014 RMK AO2 SLP206 T01560144
Visibility is 10.0 miles/16.1 Kilometers with clear conditions.
We received no rain here over the past 24 hours.
Have you ever wondered what a Blue Moon is?
From the Monday, August 24th, 2009 Farmer's Almanac
What is a Blue Moon?
For more than half a century, whenever two full Moons appeared in a single month (which happens on average every 2 1/2 to 3 years), the second has been
christened a "Blue Moon." In our lexicon, we describe an unusual event as happening "Once in a Blue Moon." This expression was first noted back in 1821
and refers to occurrences that are uncommon, though not truly rare.
On past occasions, usually after vast forest fires or major volcanic eruptions, the Moon has reportedly taken on a bluish or lavender hue. Soot and ash
particles, propelled high into the Earth's atmosphere, can sometimes make the Moon appear bluish.
Why "Blue" Moon? For the longest time nobody knew exactly why the second full Moon of a calendar month was designated as a Blue Moon. One explanation connects
it with the word "belewe" from the Old English, meaning, "to betray." Perhaps, then, the Moon was "belewe" because it betrayed the usual perception of
one full Moon per month. However, in the March 1999 issue of Sky & Telescope magazine, author Phillip Hiscock revealed one somewhat confusing origin of
this term. It seems that the modern custom of naming the second full Moon of a month "blue," came from an article published in the March 1946 Sky & Telescope
magazine. The article was "Once in a Blue Moon," written by James Hugh Pruett. In this article, Pruett interpreted what he read in a publication known
as the Maine Farmers' Almanac (no relation to this Farmers' Almanac, published in Lewiston, Maine), and declared that a second full Moon in a calendar
month is a "Blue Moon."
However, after reviewing the Maine Farmer's Almanac, Hiscock found that during the editorship of Henry Porter Trefethen (1932 to 1957), the Maine Farmers'
Almanac made occasional reference to a Blue Moon, but derived it from a completely different (and rather convoluted) seasonal rule. As simply as can be
described, according to Trefethen's almanac, there are normally three full Moons for each season of the year. But when a particular season ends up containing
four full Moons, then the third of that season is called a Blue Moon! To make matters more confusing, the beginning of the seasons listed in Trefethen's
almanac were fixed. A fictitious or dynamical mean Sun produced four seasons of equal length with dates which differed slightly from more conventional
calculations. So, basically the current use of "Blue Moon" to mean the second full Moon in a month can be traced to a 55-year-old mistake in Sky & Telescope
magazine.
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