Hailstoned

Swear I came across Noah in Belchertown-- from Quabbin on down the Swift to Palmer about 200 feet visibility-- must have gotten several inches in spots. An absolute deluge, gusty winds bringing down branches, and plenty of flash/bang.

Just got back from a little chase there, and to get my Lightning washed. Torrential torrents and a few lively bolts. Truck washed. Not a drop yet here in Monson.

Kiss of death.

Same with ours-- from few last year to riotous blue this.

Lightning blasted birch in the intense storm of this past Wednesday, on Springfield College's East Campus. Though a slim tree dwarfed by towering oaks and white pine, it took the strike instead of one of them.

Add Ludlow onto that. Pea sized hail torrential rain. Blasts of lightning/thunder. I don’t think I’ve ever seen radar fill so quick and so fast with such extreme consequences. Burst of hail just happened here in Monson also.

And the old man is snoring?

NOPE.

Then Winter must be having digestive issues. Been out a lot in the outhouse in recent years.

March, yes, but not so much February. Also telling is sap season has "migrated" to February in recent years, as opposed to its traditional timing in March.

Birds are also stirring. This weekend despite the chill, there was lots of what might be labeled, "spring anticipatory activity" along with accompanying bird calls.

Feb. 88 featured a good one out here in the B-Town/Amherst area.

1. Emojis haven't the ability to get "confused" unless AI has advanced in leaps and bounds I am not aware of. 2. "Confused" being used three times in one sentence points precisely to the source of the confusion.

10.5" final, Monson, MA.

What's different is I remember on Christmas night 1969, walking out on a pond near Boston to observe conditions in advent of this major tempest. Back then it would have been shocking to have open waters so late in December... but now...

And apples and oranges, apparently.

Yup. And so will the Passenger Pigeon.

"Stick to your long-johns until your long-johns stick to you"

And of course, Thanksgiving, 1989 with about 4" of powder falling day of, followed by 3-4 weeks of epic cold to where I jogged on ice on a section of the Chicopee River. But with the New Year, the winter more or less fizzled out.

Correct-- "machine gun" is a misrepresentation but the legality of auto/semi-auto weapons and the large magazines allowed produces more or less the same horrific results in mass shootings.

The "Wild West" when it was just 6 shooters wasn't nearly so wild as now...

The nonsense is a society where a machine gun is at the beck and call of every warped, troubled soul.

From the memory banks: 1953: Dim recollection of accompanying my dad around the yard picking up scraps of paper and the like fallen from the sky in the aftermath of the ORH tornado. Carol, 1954: Going to the car in the garage with my mother to catch news on the car radio, having lost power. Then late afternoon/early evening in the calm sunny aftermath of the hurricane, indulging in my lifetime love of throwing by picking up a blown off shingle and giving it a fling, and being reprimanded by my dad who for some reason thought it might be used again. Or maybe he didn't approve of me littering. Edna: A bird being violently flung into a window-- or was that Carol? Donna, 1960: Recall there being a very cool, fall like air mass in the days before the storm. Very heavy pre-rains, September 12, morning of, and the roaring gales when the rains let up and the core of the storm arrived, mid afternoon. Vividly recall the overwhelming scent of fresh downed trees that permeated the air in the storm's aftermath. Esther, 1961: The early-emergent hype machine was on for this one due to its intensity in the south Atlantic. Older friends of mine regaled me with tales of previous tempests such as the Great Atlantic hurricane of 1944, warning of what to expect from Esther.The weather was unseasonably warm and sultry, and I recall being fascinated by the high cloud banding effect the afternoon before the storm, and how excited I was as a pre-band arrived mid evening with gusty winds and heavy rain. But little did I know that the slow approach of the storm and its indecisive looping was to make for a let down with but lackluster gusts in the Boston suburbs where I lived. But it did do a nice job of carving a piece off of Nantucket, to this day known as Esther island. Belle, 1976: Blew its load down Long Island way; nothing up here but for sun and clouds, breezy tropical conditions. Gloria, 1985: Not unlike Esther, Gloria was a formidable hurricane on its approach from the south Atlantic, and the ever evolving hype machine was all over it. I had the great good luck the day before the storm to fly in a small plane down from Vermont to Boston, able to observe the high overcast at close hand the entire trip. The storm itself with much greater forward speed than Esther, was pretty comparable to Donna, though without the heavy pre-rains. But like Donna, the winds suddenly coming up in the early afternoon with the first casualty a neighbor's apple tree split by what seemed a relatively modest gust-maybe it got taken by surprise. But the gusts to hurricane force the rest of the afternoon were impressive, perhaps most in particular to see spray lifted off a small protected lake near our home. Bob, 1991: I chased for this one, down to the Cape and over the canal to a park not too far the other side. The hurricane was impressive, but for full impact I probably should have located to the Buzzards Bay area; seems I was a little ways to the right side of the eye. But as others have noted the back side gales were very notable, such as I witnessed driving back towards central MA up a near deserted I 495. Here in Monson about 4" of rain fell, with the wind not much of a factor.

Some frozen mini-peas mixed in with this latest wet burst.