wordsfromanneli

Thoughts, ideas, photos, and stories.

Category Archives: Weather


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Ghost Plant

I found this odd plant growing along the side of my driveway this morning. It goes by several names: monotropa uniflora, ghost plant, ghost pipe, Indian pipe, and corpse plant.

It does look rather ghostly without its green chlorophyll, but  more striking than that is the shape. I’ve only ever known it as Indian pipe, probably named for its shape similar to the traditional Indian peace pipe.

I’ve always found the Indian pipe fascinating because it is so different from most other plants. I thought it was a fungus, like a mushroom, but apparently it is considered to be in the family of Ericae, the heathers. I can’t see the connection, but I trust Wikipedia to have given me the correct information.

But the Indian pipe is parasitic on fungi, deriving its energy from the root systems of fungi rather than from sunlight. It can pop up very quickly after a rain. We did have quite a downpour yesterday and here they are!

 

By the way, you might have noticed that it is surrounded by Canada’s symbol, the “maple leaf forever,” looking a bit ratty around the edges, and no wonder, the way things are going.


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Groundhog Day

The weather gods must have heard me saying all we get is wind and rain – and okay, a little bit (a lot) of snow – so they decided to send us something different just for a bit of variety.

Is it ice for the birds to put in their drinks?  We could have a party for the birds! Maybe these are tiny marshmallows for their dessert?

Then so many of these icy particles came down that it was way more ice or marshmallows than we needed for the party. And all this, just a day after I noticed the “daffy dolls.”

Things got serious when the wind came up at the same time, causing chaos at the bird feeding station.

Oh, where is spring? I hear many of the Canadian groundhogs saw their shadow today and we’ll have six more weeks of winter. Others disagreed. I hope the others are right. I like to cheer for the under hog.

Please visit my website if you need more winter reading until spring comes for keeps.

http://www.anneli-purchase.com


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Surf’s Up

After the blizzards of the last few days, the sun came out for a few minutes, just long enough to bring the whole city out to the grocery stores and create desperate parking lot jostling and unprecedented lineups at the tills.

That all changed overnight when the wind switched direction and brought strong winds (littering our yard with branches large and small) and plenty of rain to help dissolve the snow.

Notice the larger branch that came down next to the woodshed and the smaller bits all over the rest of the ground.

I looked out at the water this morning. Our usually sheltered bay is a wee bit rough today, but … “Surf’s up!”

I’ll take a wet and windy day any time over the freezing snow blizzards we’ve had.


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Skywatcher

I’m becoming a skywatcher. Who would have thought mid-winter clouds could be so pink without a real sunrise? The cloud was a blanket over the hills. The cold snow under the blanket was turning blue.

What struck me was the contrast between the pink cloud and the cool blue snow.

The picture is not touched up. These are the weird colours of the morning sky. That’s why I ran for my camera.

The day turned stormy with a complete blanket of gray clouds scooting past only to be followed by more of the same. High southeast winds did nothing to blow the clouds away and reveal blue sky. Clouds just kept coming. I was surprised the winds were not from the north, so icy were they.

It was a weird day, weatherwise.

Winds SE 52 km (32 mph), gusts of 67 km (42 mph) later in the day.


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Lunch With Lincoln

For the third day in a row, I’ve put walnuts grown in my backyard on pieces of firewood in the woodshed. I had hoped that Lincoln would help himself to the food on these very cold, windy, rainy nights.

He did!

Today I put more walnuts out and he hovered nearby, not even running far. I went back into the house to get the camera, and he ran behind the woodshed. In a moment his curiosity got the better of him and he peeked around the corner.

As I didn’t go away, he decided he might as well go ahead and eat. He’s a bit messy, with food on his arm, but that reminded me of his injury a couple of weeks back. You can see that it’s healed, but the fur is uneven at the edge near his elbow.

Since he sat so still, eating, I made a little video of him having lunch.

 


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Not Christmas

No snow for Christmas. Just wind and rain.

While it looks pretty to have snow, it’s safer for driving if the precipitation is just water, not ice or snow.

So here we have the view today.

Blustery, gray, wet! When you see whitecaps on the water, you know it’s breezy.

Since it doesn’t look like Christmas, I decided that my baking didn’t have to be Christmassy either. Just plain comfort food is good today.

Apple pies await.

 

And the staff of life, bread, is almost ready to come out of the oven. Not Christmas bread; just bread.

(The pale part of the bread is from the light in the kitchen.)

 


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Changing Skies

A southeast system of wind and rain at the lower levels and snow at higher elevations is moving up the coast and then inland. The owners of ski hills are ecstatic.

Just look at the turmoil in the sky. The uppermost clouds are dropping moisture from  those sweeping misty fingers.

A streak of heavy cloud sits like a skinny blanket, trying to decide whether to go up or down or continue north like a long train along the middle of the hillside.

Right in the middle of the picture, just above the level of the bay water, a low snaking cloud is following the Trent River to its mouth.

 

After a few minutes I go outside to take another picture as the clouds darken, and the hillside falls into shadow.

The layers of clouds have begun to separate and the lower ones seem to be churning in confusion. Where to go next?

Right now I’m happy to have the rain at sea level and the snow up higher where the skiers can enjoy it. If it keeps on raining, ask me in a week how I feel about it then.

And if it’s a rainy day, it’s perfect for reading a good book. I’ve written five of them for you. Just check out my web page at www.anneli-purchase.com to find out more about them. They make perfect Christmas gifts.


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Lookout Pass

Still dodging ice clumps that may or may not have rock-like centers, we are nevertheless, making progress in leaving the snow behind.

We pass the small town of St. Regis, near our Exit 16 refuge, where we will stay the night again.

Then another climb awaits us up into the hills to the Montana/Idaho border at Exit 0, Lookout Pass. The good thing about this pass is that it is about 2000 feet lower than that last one we went through, and less likely to be snowed in.

By the way, notice that “Lookout” is spelled as one word, as in “viewpoint.” I had started to think of it as two words (look out) like “watch out,” but its elevation is not nearly as high as MacDonald Pass so I must get this two-word definition out of my head. It’s just a pass with a gorgeous view from the top. The photo below is from 2015 (no snow). We didn’t stop to photograph the view this year.

Sure enough, the roads are fairly clear, in spite of snow hanging onto the trees right down to the level of the road.

Once we were over that hump, the rest of the crossing of the Idaho panhandle brought us ever closer to fall weather as we knew it.

We felt as if we were truly getting closer to home. Our next stay would be in Omak, Washington. I want to call it “Oboy!” instead of Omak because of the mini dramas that happened to us there. I’ll tell you all about it soon.