For the last seven months I’ve been writing about the Bay Area weather for the excellent group city-blog The SFist. From here on I’ll be posting my weatherist entries here as well. I’ve found that writing /about/ the weather is much more interesting than the actual weather itself. I think you’ll enjoy it too even if you’re no where near our rain, there’s a reason we talk about the weather everyday … it’s fascinating and inscrutible. It’s epic compared to even humankind’s biggest weapons and more molecular than nanotechnology dreams to be.

Winters Solstice 2005

Nothing we can do about it now. The umbrellas are already stored by the front door (if not hopelessly lost), the ineffective heating units are on (unless they’re broken) and our MUNI rides feel like we’re living in some underground steam rooms. But, we love it. Really. Without having to trudge through snow or over ice-treachery we can slow our paces, put on some cozy goodness, hunker down in a warm place and enjoy a calmer time of year.

The atheists and earthists out there (wish we had a hand sign we could flash right now) know today is the last crucial day of our year. It’s the winter solstice. Today at noon the sun will be as close to the horizon as it will get. The length of day will be an anemic 9 hours and 32 minutes. There’s a total of 59 more minutes of visible light that compose our day, which means we will experience 13 hours and 29 minutes of complete darkness tonight. (Again hand signs of props to all our vampire peeps out there … what up undead! yo!)

And of course, it being December 21st, to accompany our paltry sunlight we’ll see bands of rainfall throughout the day. This time of year cyclone after cyclone (that is the term, though in our case it’s hardly a destructive force) are generated over the Pacific, circling counter-clockwise, moving east, in what is described is gloomily described as a conveyor belt fashion. The majority of our winter rains form not far from Hawaii in the form of swirling low pressures that leave “precipitable water” for us to enjoy. As rains go, this is what we prefer. Impulses of pretty mild rain that last for 30-60 minutes and move on. Later in the year we’ll start seeing northern-formed lows bearing down from the North Pacific. These are the ones the snow enthusiasts love because they are cold and fierce. In the Bay Area they are roughly translated into umbrella eaters.

As for the forecast part, expect rains over the next two days. If you’re flying in or out of SFO and you see even a drop of rain, check your flight and get there EARLY. Any visible precipitation requires they shut down their second runway so all in and out happens on one runway, even though they’ve done nothing to decrease the number of daily planes. (Another furious hand signal to our peeps passing their 5th hour at the Crab Pot, we feels ya. yo!). And for those who are going to be right here for the next week, we’re not predicting any Festivus miracles (you know … when you wake early and see everything covered in glistening fresh sunshine ;) but the weather should be dry and the air calm.

So Happy Solstice Everyone and To All A Long Night!