... you can talk all night.
And no, I've got no pictures for you today. I got up at 5 and looked out the window and thought how could it have rained? It's 24°. But the sidewalks had that rained-on look — brown. That has to be ice. I delayed going out, and though it got sunny and the temperature rose above freezing, a ridiculous wind kicked up. I played it safe and stayed inside. Now, it's dark at last.
Do you realize the entire dark season — darkest 3-month period of the year — is over and we've entered one of the 2 periods of the year when the light and dark are most balanced?
I've explained my thinking before: "I think the seasons are wrongly divided. They shouldn't begin with an equinox/solstice, but should have the equinox/solstice put right in the middle. That would correspond to how I feel about the seasons: It's about light, not temperature. Winter should have the solstice as its center and should end by mid-February and so forth.”
And: "I would call the seasons: 1. Dark Time (with winter solstice in the middle), 2. Dark-Light Time (with spring equinox in the middle), 3. Light Time (summer solstice in middle), and 4. Light-Dark Time (with fall equinox in middle). Don't worry about the temperature. That can vary. The light and dark are absolutely nailed down."
So, despite the ice and wind, we're in Dark-Light Time now.
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Loury and McWhorter say good riddance to DEI but favor positive things like Black History Month.
Black history month is a month celebrating the accomplishments of a group with an average IQ of 86. I mean, that's how it's felt. There are lots of smart blacks, is the lesson of the month. But few enough that it deserves a month remarking on them. In short, it's perverse marketing. There's no demand for white male month for a reason. You expect accomplishments.
We have warm but the sunlight is still low. Another couple weeks and the second fall for the oaks will happen, then we’re in pollen season. We can plow pollen in some years…
Does that mean when Sarah Huckabee Sanders wins the Presidency in 2028 she will usher in the Light time?
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/us/news/2025/02/06/black-hawk-helicopter-safety-system-turned-off-dc-crash/
Bet you REGRET voting for TRUMP now!
Prof, you're the Empress of Althousia, and can name the seasons any way you want.
My walk this morning was slower than usual. I walked down Highland. That was not fun. Roads were a-ok. Sidewalks emphatically were not. I stayed on the grass as much as I could. Didn't fall. Win!
"It's about light"
The problem with that as an equinox, is the equinox would then be dependent on what Latitude you are at. Because as much as the day/night cycle is roughly equal for you, it isn't for other places on the planet and never will be across the whole of the planet.
On the other hand, the equinox has never been about temperature either. The equinox is when the sun (source of light and heat) is at the equator, halfway between the top and bottom of the Earth along its rotation, although that rotation is tilted. If the Earth didn't have a tilt, then we would essentially always have an equal day and night cycle.
The seasons should run by month according to grade school decorations. March-May are spring. Sep-Nov are fall. Fill in the rest yourself.
Totally agree that the solstice and equinox days are stupid starting points.
Shhh. Ya not to say anything negative about the female helo pilot. Saint Rebecca has her own niche, right next to Trayvon Martin and Geo Floyd, in the DEI Cathedral.
I'm wouldn't object to dividing up the seasons as you do, but could we still call them winter, spring, summer and fall. Dark Time, Dark-Light Time, Light Time and Light-Dark Time sound too similar.
Why four seasons? And why the same seasons for everyone? The etymology of the word season relates to the Latin word, satio, for seed planting. You can tell from seed catalogs that every region has different times for planting and harvesting. The Los Angeles basin (not the valleys) has a season for mostly maritime onshore flow of cool moist air from approximately mid-April until September, followed by a hot dry season until November, followed by cool weather (mid 40's to mid 60's) interspersed with rainstorms and Santa Ana winds (fires, mudslides, and floods) from November to the middle of April. The amount of hourly sunlight figures into it, but doesn't seem to matter all that much.
"The problem with that as an equinox, is the equinox would then be dependent on what Latitude you are at. Because as much as the day/night cycle is roughly equal for you, it isn't for other places on the planet and never will be across the whole of the planet."
Ummm... that's not right. The equinox occurs at a precise moment, which is the same everywhere. The time on the clock when this happens is just different for different places. As well, there are 12 hours each of day and night everywhere on earth at that time.
Remember when we were told RFK Jr. couldn't be a good choice to run HHS, because he put rodents in blenders to feed his pet snakes.
Well:
"New federal contracts obtained by WCW via FOIA show 300 beagles per week are being force-fed and injected with drugs in wasteful tests in China funded with our tax dollars.
The documents from the Chinese lab state: “Beagle dog is docile, cute, and easy to domesticate, so it has been the best choice.”
The National Institutes of Health and the Department of Defense are funding this puppy abuse in China through a recently extended contract."
"Why four seasons?"
And why does autumn/fall have two names but the other three only have one?
If you have not seen this yet, you need to watch it.
https://x.com/isaiahlcarter/status/1887290743032561803?s=61
A Black man leaves the Democrat party. The best explanation I have seen yet.
It's interesting to read the morning paper now. It's about 4 News Cycles behind because of all the things Trump is doing, mostly good, some I might question. Still has a crossword puzzle though.
Whoever shut off the transponders was remarkably irresponsible
Now it's dark - Blue Velvet (1986)
https://eko.substack.com/p/override
Was never keen on that film
I agree. The Celts did it right.
Imbolc
I would re-align the months to fit the seasons:
Fall - September October November
Winter - December to Feb
Spring - March to May
Summer - June July Aug
I subscribe to Althouse's division. But, as she observed this morning, the lived experience of humans that resulted in the traditional seasons is that lag (especially pronounced when you live near large bodies of water): warmth hangs on longer than the fall equinox, and cold hangs on longer than the spring equinox.
I refuse to think of March 1 as "Winter" or December 1 as "Fall"
I have to say I'm very disappointed in our New Soviet Democraticals that it took them until the 3rd week of the Trump admin to formally present articles of impeachment against him.
The New Soviet Democraticals are clearly off their game.
of course, your names for seasons only work in the mid-latitudes of the northern hemisphere. the southern hemisphere could have your names, reversed. the poles could have more extreme versions of your names: very light, very dark. the equator would just be light-dark (or dark-light) all the time.
Went surfing today in North East Florida at the river mouth of the St Johns River. Air was 75°, water was 60°+ and these were 2'-3' perfection bright blue and glossy. Only four other surfers were out and our cars parked on beach above the high tide line were safe. At 72 this is my 60th year of surfing.
Yes the equinox occurs at the precise moment the sun crosses the equator, which is the same everywhere. Althouse was suggesting an equinox when day and night duration is the exact same. Even if it was exactly the same in Madison, WI; it wouldn't be the same in Lima, Peru.
Unknown said…
“of course, your names for seasons only work in the mid-latitudes of the northern hemisphere. the southern hemisphere could have your names, reversed.”
Llaf, remmus, gnirps, retniw?
Via Reddit: Rick Astley's cover of "Ain't No Sunshine"
Because of Althouse, I now think of the time from mid-November to mid-January as “Darkmunth.”
Gaelic pagan tradition has the same demarcation of seasons, marked by these festival days:
Imbolc, February 1
Beltane, May 1
Lughnasadh, August 1
Samhain, November 1
Via Reddit: DOGE ushers in a new beginning
I'm always amused by periodically taking note of the shape of the terminator line. Windows clock app displays the flattened map of the world with the current terminator map. On the equinoxes, the dark/light patches are rendered as basically a rectangle. On the solstices, the terminator curve is at its maximum showing the latitudes closest to the poles that are constant light/dark and the drastic differences between lengths of daytime and nighttime based on latitude.
For weather statistics winter is already Dec-Feb, and so on. Much cleaner that way.
Democrats and ChiComs can all die in a fire.
I am watching the labor that the DOGEnauts have undertaken in the sewer that is DC, and I am wondering, why haven't we seen any references to the Augean stables?
Blacks are Americans too.
"second fall for the oaks". Is that like, a second fall of acorns?
Those in fact are referred to as the meteorological seasons, as opposed to the astronomical seasons. In America it works well: Meteorological Summer is Memorial Day to Labor Day. Fall is roughly Labor Day to Thanksgiving. We just don't have a holiday around March 1st to make it complete.
Firefighters kept from Palisades, Eaton front lines due to unserviced LAFD vehicles (KTLA 5)
I'm also very conscious of light and dark. It's striking to me that the days start getting longer on the first day of winter, and shorter on the first day of summer, though it's not really noticeable until a few weeks later.
thx
There is a J6 political prisoner, whose son turned him in to the FBI. He was included in Trump's pardon, and he has been released from the Democrat Gulag. He is reunited with his family, and apparently the son is estranged from the other members. I read an article on this, on some site, that ended with a poll; "If you were this father, would you ever be able to forgive your son?". Without really giving it much thought, I clicked on "yes". If my son shot me through the heart, I would die forgiving him. I was astonished to see that "yes" was less than 30%.
@Jupiter, no reference to the Augean stables and you won’t see one. No lefty wants to compare their illicit undertakings to horseshit.
Treason against family is the worst.
Local Media
Oh, yeah. Summer is dying as soon as it's born. But Winter also. Even as the days grow colder, they grow longer. For our hostess;
"He not busy being born ..."
Yes indeed. And refusing to forgive would be the deepest treason.
Reading that a member of Elon’s DOGE team resigned over a racist post.
This is all they got, folks.
Freezing rain Wednesday night and a coat of ice on the deck and driveway this morning. By midafternoon we were up to 60. Such is winter weather in Virginia.
He sounds great.
I forgive but I don't forget
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