News From Browntown

Springtime in Browntown

Spring 2006 has been nothing but excitement for ol' Bob (I Love Weather) Ryan, let me tell you. Within the past four day period the northern Shenandoah Valley has been whipped around with the following meteorological events:
Tuesday
blizzard conditions resulting in measurable snowfall
sub-freezing temperatures
daytime overcast skies dark enough to trigger automatic night lights
afternoon temperatures in the 70s
sunshine and blue skies
All that within seven hours of one day!
Wednesday
Sunshine and blue skies
tornado warnings
Gusting wind warnings (especially on the Interstates)
lashing rain and sleet
high temps in the upper 50s
Thursday
Sunshine and blue skies
high temps in the upper 60s
Friday
All I can say at this point is ... whew, we made it this far!
It is raining (a good thing) and overcast
Temp forecast is for 60s today but no sunshine or blue skies expected for a couple days

The rain is a good thing since we are in a drought and the Spring growth is considerably less spectacular than usual due to lack of moisture. The winds have been incredible. The windows and roof on the poor old homestead rattled and roared as loud as I have ever heard. Two nights this week it was kind of like trying to sleep by the side of a railroad track with a never-ending train passing by. There will be very little outdoor fun this week-end so it is a good thing that we have some indoor plans. We are meeting Kris and Christian for lunch in Harrisonburg on Saturday. They will be in Bridgewater packing up Kris's show and we got our bid in for a bit of time with them. We are looking forward to it since it is so seldom we get together these days. Might even be the last opportunity for a good long while if they re-locate to Germany.

Sunday we are very excited to meet Kris (Win's Kris, that is - this could get confusing) and have Win home for a few hours. I hope the weather is decent enough for a walk around "the compound" and a look at Browntown in Springtime. Although Spring is not at it's best this year what with the meterological events, etc. (see above) at least Kris can see where Win grew up. I have no doubt a ride up to the 4-H Center will be in the plan.

Dad is in Baltimore this week and comes home this evening. He is gearing up for the house painting/maintenance/repair project that starts next week. I guess he will end up with a lawn chair out there in the yard supervising - at least during the hours he is home. He might need some pointers on sidewalk supervising from Uncle Rich - I think Unk got pretty good at it when they were building their house in Berryville as I recall.

Grammy has had a busy week with the funeral of a garden club member's husband and helping Rose pack up to move from Stephens City back to Front Royal. In fact, she spent the night at Rose's last night and it felt quite lonesome on "the compound" with just Cleo and me.

Maybe I need to learn how to take pix with the cell phone so I can do what other bloggers do and post pix of such things as Spring snow, weird sights on the highway, Cleo doing stuff (napping mostly these days), etc. What do you think? Oh, I have to remember to get before and after pix of the house, too, before the face lift project starts!