While March showed some lamb-like weather this past weekend, Spring is officially rolling in like a blustery lion. Today, the Vernal Equinox (which actually occurred at 7:21pm EDT) marks the celestial point when the sun shines directly on the equator and the length of day and night are nearly equal in all parts of the world. But while the giant star might be doing something special today somewhere behind the snow clowds, I’m not sure we’ll be able to notice it much.
Here in Baristaville, we’ve moved almost fully round the seasons in the past few days — though not in the correct order.
If Friday was summer, Sunday was spring and Monday is winter, will we have autumnal weather on Wednesday? Nah, it’s only March doing its wacky thing.
Feature photo by M Sobers-Levitt.
Just looked out the periscope from my bunker/office. Crap. You may quote me.
I second your crap and raise it to a Bah Humbug!
Elevating to a fervent and resounding WTF.
Debbie,
The Vernal Equinox occured yesterday at 7:21pm EDT. The reason it says 23:21 on Wikipedia is that times that deal with the entire planet are listed in Coordinated Universal Time (UTC) (basically what we used to call Greenwich Mean Time – or GMT). During Daylight Savings, you need to subtract 4 hours for Baristaville.
Carl,
I didn’t write this one, Erika did. I corrected the previous post. But the question remains: why are so fixated on this detail?
Sorry Deb,
About this detail? Nothing in particular. I’ve always thought that details of fact are important – especially in Journalism. When you get the facts wrong, you undermine the credibility of the rest of your content – consciously or unconsciously – with anyone who notices the error. Unlike print media, you can correct errors – essentially improving your content after publication – to me, that’s a tremendous advantage, and one of the reasons to prefer this medium.
It’s not intended as criticism, no one could reasonably expect you guys to pump out the content on the wide range of subjects that you do and be perfect – especially given the volume that you produce and your staffing levels – heck, I find errors in the Ledger all the time, and even in the Times now and again.
The Times makes errors? Who knew?
Of course, we’re also more likely to read stories (and notice errors) related to subjects in which we are interested. In this case, because I’m an amateur astronomer, I’m more likely to pay attention to the details (and notice an error) when you or Erika write about the equinox.
I wish to file a formal complaint about this morning’s weather. When I looked out at 7AM it was raining. By the time I got outside at 7:55 my car was covered with slush.
Friday I was gazing at my yard, wondering how I could squeeze more trees into it. (I was also wondering if I could get arrested for planting trees in the neighbors’ yards.)
Today I was wishing I had my snow boots on as I slogged thru the Land of the Never-Draining Puddles (downtown Newark).
Mierda!!
I find it funny that “Carl” gave so much attention to “detail” in the article but wrote back to the wrong writer. I’m blaming it on the moon.
Carl, maybe you can shed some light (no pun intended) on my feelings of disequilibrium yesterday. It was a day of strange energy and mishaps, ranging from minor forgetfulness to the death of a loved one, which I found out about just as the equinox was occurring in our part of the planet (according to your information). Is the Vernal Equinox like the full moon in causing strange energy? Did it cosmically collide with the Super Moon? Was the timing just a coincidence?
Sorry to hear about the death of your loved one, Erika.
It was the revenge of Pluto, Erika. Carl can fill you in.
Don’t you mean this guy:?
http://www.railbirds.com/gallery/2008/02/201056bluto.jpg
Made you look!
“How can you mend a broken link? How can you stop the rain from coming down?”
Not Found The requested URL /gallery/2008/02/201056bluto.jpg was not found on this server.
As an intellectual pain in the ass, cro, you are tops. As an html coder, you leave much to be desired.
Jenn, would you help this guy out? He needs some boot camp.
Where’s global warming when you need it?
As is often the case as one ages, walleroo, sometimes “links” work, and sometimes they do not.
I wouldn’t know, cro. In addition to inventing a technique of removing brain tumors without damaging the surrounding tissue, I have also found a way to lengthen telomeres indefinitely, granting eternal youth. This is why I still don’t look a day over twenty, even though my degree from Harvard medical school dates from before the invention of antibiotics. The drawback is that one must undergo an exceedingly painful treatment once a year. I’ll spare you the grisly details. Think of it as the molecular-biological equivalent of a prostate exam.
I’ve no interest in eternal youth, walleroo. Though I wouldn’t mind a “do over” or three.
As Sophocles said, one must wait until the evening in order to see how splendid the day has been.
Erika,
Sorry for your loss. I would be most inclined to attribute any feelings of disequilibrium to that. However, the “supermoon” is an extra-close full moon, and those have been known to mess up the equilibrium. As far as the Vernal Equinox is concerned, the only factor I can think of would be that it comes at the end of what was a truly miserable winter.
“Magicwoman”,
As I said in my post, my posting was not intended as criticism – merely a correction. The fact is that Debbie is the Editor-in-Chief of this publication and she wrote the original story and she has a credit on this story – if addressing the note to Deb was an error, it was certainly a minor one – kind of like putting my name in quotes.
That said, I do not work for Baristanet – I post when I can, often under hurried conditions, and my posts appear in the “Comments” section. The Baristas do work for Baristanet, and their articles appear as content – only an idiot would conflate the two.
Carl and Walleroo, thanks for your condolences. Carl, my disequilibrium began early in the day, before I heard about the death, so I’m blaming it on the Super Moon into Equinox phenomenon.
Did you mean this Bluto? http://www.railbirds.com/gallery/2008/02/20105bluto.jpg
Erika, Sorry for your loss. I hope you hurt is replaced with memoeies of many happy times together.