Wall Street Takes A Hit

And not a moment too soon. One of the things I find interesting and try to keep current on is the economic structure of our civilization. I was getting a little tired of the US Federal Government stepping in with their ability to create electronic money out of thin air (more debt) and using it to rescue companies who really should be allowed to go bankrupt due to the companys' poor business decisions. It's called the principle of moral hazard. If you insulate companies and individuals from the consequences of their actions, it's not a good thing.

So today I felt something I haven't felt for a while: a sense of respect for the Feds. They held their ground. They didn't bail out Lehman Brothers. I don't expect that practice to continue, but it felt good today.

And such fiscally responsible actions are the morally right thing to do for future generations. They will be the ones wondering what were we thinking when we saddled them with unpayable mountains of debt that has the potential to destroy our currency through hyperinflation, or crash the economy into deflation. It's happened throughout history with other countries that were fiscally irresponsible, and we are not immune.

So, vote for the most fiscally responsible candidates! (Good luck figuring out who they are).

Enough ranting. Enjoy this wonderful late summer weather.

How Great Is This?

I've held off on posting about how great the weather is lately, since more often than not, whenever I mention how great the weather is lately, it takes a sudden turn for the worse. It's a knack of mine.

But I can't stand it anymore. The weather the past 2 weeks has been absolutely incredibly great. There, I've said it. Let the weather chips fall where they will.

September has always been my favorite weather month in Hood River (closely followed by the other 11 months). Typically warm days, cool nights, and the wind tends to die down in the transition from summer to fall.

Tomorrow marks the full Harvest Moon. Get out there and harvest, or at least celebrate the bounty from those that do plant and harvest. One excellent way to do that is to support locally grown food.

Site Down

Not sure why, but the Hood River Weather site is experiencing intermittent down times this afternoon and evening. Our weather station data is still being uploaded successfully to Weather Underground. Hopefully the problem will resolve sooner than later.

August Revisited

Compared to historical averages, August in Hood River was warmer, less windy, and slightly wetter.

The average temperature was 2.9 degrees warmer than long term averages, but only 0.4 degrees warmer than more recent averages (2000-2007). Wind speeds were considerably lower than average, with southwest winds predominating.

There were 4 local weather records set during the month. On August 6, the high of 102 broke the old record of 98 (1972). On August 16, the high of 106 broke the old record of 100 (1977). On August 17, the high of 107 broke the old record of 104 (1977). And on August 28, the low of 38 broke the old record of 40 (1960).

	High	Low	Average	Historical Average
Temperature (F)	107	38	69.6	66.7
Wind (mph)	32		3.7	4.4
Rainfall (in)	0.21		0.49 (total)	0.39

Goodbye Heat Index, Hello Wind Chill

Seeing as how it's a windy, cool Labor Day weekend, what better time for me to switch the Hood River Weather site from displaying "heat index" to displaying "wind chill". It just feels right. And chillier...

Plus, I do this every year in September. Heat index from June through August, and wind chill the rest of the time. One of life's little traditions. Happy Labor Day to y'all.