January 8, 2022
My Almost Daily Journal-Discovering The Farmers’ Almanac/Artic Blast In the Northeast
Volume 12-Tag Along With Me on My Sometimes Boring Sometimes Interesting Sometimes Humorous Journey Through Life
Welcome back to my journal. Hopefully, you are finding some nuggets of interest in my journal entries. How many of you read or have read the Farmers’ Almanac? I have always been fascinated by it and usually either buy a copy every year or receive it as a gift. To be honest, I never spent too much time reading it (except the weather outlooks) mainly because I was still working. Now that I am retired, I am taking more interest. Of course, it is well known for the weather forecasts it contains. But there is much more. Let’s take a closer look.
Christmas Still Lingers-At Least at Our House
Well, it is January 7th and we still have Christmas decorations up. But for us, this is not unusual. For those of you following my journal, I hope you enjoyed all the photos I shared of our many Christmas trees. We have started the process of taking them down, and will probably finish by Martin Luther King Day. This is the target date we normally choose to finish.
We enjoy the decorations as long as possible; for example, the dining room is normally the last room we take down. The theme of that room is blue and silver with snowflakes. So it still goes well in January, at least here in Central New York. As the snow falls outside and the days are still short, the blue and white lights and decorations turn magical at night, creating a beautiful winter scene. As the Winter winds blow outside, the indoor scene is wonderful.
However, all good things must come to an end. After the blue and silver decorations come down in the dining room, what could be next for the dining room? Stay tuned to find out!
This popular almanac has been published since 1818. Yes, 1818. Think about that for a minute. And yes, of course, now there's a website. And a web store for merchandise. But that all aside, let's focus on the almanac itself, the good old paperback version. I will write about the website another day. Following is a summary of the content of this publication:
- The sections seem to be arranged alphabetically. The first in the table of contents is Astronomy. This section contains a wealth of information including visible planets guide, meteor showers, astronomical events and much more.
- Obviously, the Farmers’ Almanac has been geared towards farming and gardening since its inception. Next is Best Days and Planning Calendars. There is a lot of information including topics such as animal gestation tables, the best days to set eggs, besting planting days, frost dates, fall foliage dates. And more.
- Moving on, next up is Food and Recipes, with a least six articles including sweet potato recipes.
- Home and Garden. This contains a sampling of articles including Helpful Hints & Hacks, Companion Planting, Gardening by the Moon, and many more. If you are a gardener this section is for you.
- Finally, the last section is Weather and Outdoors, the meat and potatoes of the almanac, at least for me. The information in this section includes weather zone maps, monthly forecasts, and more. All the info you need to look ahead to the weather in 2022, no matter where you live in the U.S. I find all their maps, tables, data, and forecasts very interesting to say the least. They even explain how they arrive at all their predictions.
I encourage you to get a copy and explore. Honestly, I have just started myself this year, since I received it as a gift from my wife for Christmas. In future journal entries, I may take a closer look at some of the articles and weather predictions.
This week we missed two big snowstorms, the first of which, as I’m sure you heard about, shut down I-95 in Northern Virginia for over a day, stranding thousands of motorists for 24 hours or more. The second storm hit yesterday, January 7th; we only received an inch here. Much more along the Atlantic seaboard.
However, following the second storm, we are being hit with cold and windy conditions, which is bringing us a little lake effect snow off of Lake Ontario. Hopefully enough for some cross-country skiing this weekend. Time will tell.
The latest forecast from Direct Weather:
Farmers Almanac Forecast:
For Zone 1 (Northeast and New England), for January 8th to 11th, “Series of coastal systems brings 4 to 8 inches of snow across NY, PA, New England; a wintry mix farther South.”
Very interesting, the Northeast just had 2 nor’ easters.
Would You Like to Read All of My Stories? Membership is only $5 Per Month. I would really appreciate this!