Life in A Cloud

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For those of you new to the blog you may not know that The Institute, the source of the many excellent but interesting posts you receive daily, sits high in the Rocky Mountains in Northern Colorado. Not Andes high or Himalayan high, but moderately high at just under 6500′.

So what, you might ask, if you were the rude type. Well, it means that at this altitude, 6500′, we get a lot more weather than folks living lower than us. What might be a rain cloud high in the sky to them may be a raging hail storm at this elevation. They’re looking at the bottom of a cloud and don’t see what’s going on inside it. Or a brisk wind down on the flats might be 70 mph up here and that will scatter your lawn chairs all over hell and back.

Lately we’ve been getting a lot of “fronts” moving in which brings clouds over and around us and often below us, usually all at the same time. I say fronts because we rarely get “backs” unless the clouds move backwards for some reason, which it does sometimes for reasons known only to itself. So I guess that could be considered a “back”.

The Institute buildings sit prominently on a point just below the summit of a world-famous mountain, it, the mountain not the Institute, being featured on many maps and even Google Earth, jutting out into space and consequently into the weather whenever it occurs. Visualize all the many imposing Schloss’s or castles you have seen in magazines, movies, and your imagination along with craggy rustic buildings set in high lonely places and mix them together and you have an idea of what The Institute aspires to look like and fails dismally at, and you have an idea of what we look like.

But getting back to the fronts we spoke of earlier. When they bring the clouds in to envelope us in misty darkness, they are loaded to the very gills with water in the form of suspended droplets completely filling the inside of that cloud. There is simply no room left for anything else. Not even lightning. It is packed tight. When the cloud moves back and forth due to some climatic reason it bangs into whatever happens to be there, like say, The Institute, and as it collides with our buildings the water inside the cloud just adheres to them. Sticks to the sides, saturating everything with impunity, and creates problems that are different than one gets in a rainstorm. The water doesn’t just fall downward and run down the sides like rain, it instantly saturates everything, walls, roof, under the eaves, into every single nook and cranny, sort of like running your house through a car wash. Think grabbing your house by its roof and plunging it into a vat of water until bubbles come out of its little chimney and you have some idea of what it’s like to live in a cloud.

Now before you think that that is a totally bad thing, it’s not. In fact it’s kind of cool. If you’ve done all your proper caulking and waterproofing that is. You can stay inside and light a fire in the fireplace without fear of accidentally burning down the forest from errant embers. You can read, pull your chair right up to the window and watch the cloud move back and forth. Drink hot tea. Think about stuff you don’t normally take time out to think about. Ponder, some. Call your neighbors and say “Hey, you got cloud?” They almost always do if you do. It’s a time to relax and say “Well I don’t have to mow the lawn today.” and just enjoy the weather.

There are other good parts too, like when the clouds move in and when they move out. If the movement happens at either end of the day, like sunrise in the shot above, you get a bonus of seeing morning in a different way. That alone makes up for some of the crap side of living in a cloud. Shortly after that image was taken the cloud moved backwards up the hill and we got wet. But for a brief moment you got to see paradise. Living in a cloud isn’t always a bad thing.

CloudMaker

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When Spring slowly morphs into Summer, like a young girl easing into adulthood, there is a certain amount of drama involved. Spring is an awakening and as the days pass and the maturity of Summer beckons the weather patterns change. The gentle spring days with their warm sunshine and gentle rains begins to alter as the new experiences of longer days and the other influences affect her. There is an anxious volatility now and an expression of anticipation and anger and a desire to rush headlong into this new aspect of life.

This is when we get our late Spring storms. Everyday it seems there is a new formation that can range from slowly moving billowing cloud banks to the fierce and violent thunderheads that lash out with lightning and swirling winds and torrents of rain. Tonight we have something in between.

This particular cloud is undecided at the moment. Not sure if it should develop into a full-blown tantrum or simply pout a little before gently dispersing into the night sky. Without the sun to heat it to the boiling point it’s a good bet that this little bit drama will suffice for the day. But there is always tomorrow, when each new day brings new beauty and new experiences. I can’t wait.

Cloud Alert!

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Warning! Cloud Alert!  Clouds entirely too Low for Public Safety! Huge Shadows complicate vision!

We break into our regularly scheduled programming to bring you this important Public Service Announcement (PSA to those in the warning others business). There are cloud patterns forming all over the Southwest that could present dangerous conditions to those caught unaware. Abrupt summertime meteorology cause clouds to form that due to their rapid origination are too heavy to stay high in the sky where they belong. Their weight forces them ever downward until they begin to bang into the higher features in the landscape like Buttes, Promontories, Spires and other tall stuff, causing damage and unsafe conditions. So if you have a Butte make sure to keep it low to the ground and if possible, make sure to cover your Butte for maximum safety. Occasionally this phenomenon will be accompanied by shadows which obscure the landscape causing a deterioration in viewing conditions and moisture of unknown composition to fall onto the ground and anything on it. The obvious danger here is wetness, which can dampen your clothes and cause spotting on your glasses if you wear them.

If these conditions form while you are out viewing scenery, immediately crouch as low to the ground as your waistline will allow and cover your eyes and ears to prevent serious if not harmful damage to your own self and others around you. If you need to return to your vehicle before the conditions change, or you notice the cloud getting closer to you, carefully run backwards staying as low to the ground as possible and taking full advantage of any available cover such as low lying shrubbery or overhanging rocks. Keep calm. In some instances letting out low moaning sounds or saying ‘Ooooooh Mannnnn” quietly under your breath will help you stay focused until you reach safety. Secondary warning: Watch for Snakes. It may be preferable to be caught by a cloud as opposed to being bit by a snake. That is a decision you will have to make depending on prevailing conditions. A factor to consider while making this choice is the current cost of hospital care and the slowness of insurance companies to make payments. This may be complicated further by the high number of uninsured that clog up the emergency rooms while you are trying to be treated for snakebite. A little dampness and the cold clammy feeling of cloud shadow may be  preferable to catastrophic hospital bills. This is always a personal decision. Some people will choose snakebite over dampness because for them money is no object.

We here at the Institute, that of course is the Institute of Regained Knowledge, or IRK, strive to help our fellow man and provide these needed services free of charge so that you and your loved ones can have a safe and happy experience in the out-of-doors. Making you aware of the dangers that lurk outside your very doorways that could ‘Get You’ if you were not completely informed, has been one of the top priorities of our organization. No need to thank us, really, we do this as a public service in the hope that it enriches your lives and in some small unknown way ours too. Please help us help others by passing this message on and informing them that they too could be saved unknown amounts of trouble if they only read and subscribe to our blog.

Remember, Be Safe out there and if this does help or prevent some incredibly huge personal catastrophe you can go ahead and quietly thank IRK, we won’t mind.

We Interrupt our Regular…….

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As you are no doubt aware from all the recent attention by the Nation’s press, the World Headquarters of our Media Empire is located in the foothills of the Rocky Mountains. The Royal viewing room, um, I meant the office, looks East where every morning the sun comes up and starts our day. Things may be different where you live but that’s how it works here. Yesterday it snowed for the entire day and although it didn’t accumulate all that much it did cover our grounds completely. The Staff in their usual surly manner began the task of sweeping the snow off our dirt driveway. As you might imagine there was much good-natured grumbling but they knew it was a necessary task that they needed to complete if they wanted to eat. But that’s not the real story, the real story concerns the incredible cloud cover that sometimes happens after one of our storms. A meteorologist could tell you the scientific name for clouds like this but unfortunately, due to budget restraints and sequestration we had to let ours go. Looking out over the surrounding area you see a sea of clouds under which are entire towns, lots of cows, some people riding bikes, the transmitting towers of the world’s atomic clock, (seriously every time your computer updates it time, the signal came from a little pulse sent from the towers near the World Headquarters of our Media Empire) and etc. Under there it is still dark and cold, they won’t see the sun for another hour or so until the cloud cover is burned off by the thermonuclear reaction above. But meanwhile above all that there is an absolute riot of shifting shapes, entire mountain ranges build up and are dissolved in moments, seas form and huge waves are cast forth that never reach a shore, and once in a while when we’ve been particularly good, a rainbow begins to form, like the one to the right of the sunburst. This isn’t RainbowNomics as such (see previous post)  because we didn’t order this one, it is simply a gift from the universe. It is faint to be sure, but it is there and we are thankful. Normally we do not interrupt our regular posting, but we wanted to share this special event with you, why?, well, because we love you of course.

 

Cloudscapes

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Huge, billowing clouds moving slowly across the sky have always been an arresting sight for me. Memories of childhood float up from the depths and soon you are seeing sailing ships and improbable animals and one that might even look like your loopy uncle Skid, although I guess its possible you didn’t have a loopy uncle Skid. We did and he was great. People travel great distances to see the light and sky of other places but we  have that magic right here in our back yard in Colorado. The images that follow were taken from our deck looking west towards Rocky Mountain National Park as we gently eased into sunset.

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As the sun moved further towards the west the light began to take on a reddish hue

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Soon the blue and white was being replaced by reds and yellows and pinks

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and some of the thunderheads were taking on a pronounced bluish-black underside.

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When the sun goes behind the hilltops and ridges the lower parts of the clouds go dark while the upper parts can be brilliantly highlighted.

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Then as full darkness approaches the gold comes out. There is still some blue in the background because the mountains are lower over there and let the last of the sunlight through.

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An explosion of gold and orange and yellows is brought into even greater contrast by the black undersides of this mammoth cloud. That’s the last hurrah, like that incredible finale at a fireworks exhibition. The only thing missing is the William Tell overture playing in the background.

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The sun is completely set and this last look is tinged in blues and purples with rose highlights, the evenings swansong.