Icy queen, frigid heart
A frosty, gusty morning has chipped loose an apt bit of poetry from one the government forecasters out at Sterling. Says he:
"With cool temperatures expected today, an appropriate stanza from an obscure play likely not written by Shakespeare comes to mind:
"'O icy Queen, thy frigid heart doth slay the mortal folk who wake to toil by day.'"
Who knew they hired English majors at the National Weather Service? Good for them. Good for English majors. A MarylandWeather.com lip balm keychain to the first person who can provide the citation.
Anyway, there's more cold air rolling out of the North Country today. Lake-effect snows are still prompting Winter Snow Warnings throughout the day in Garrett and western Allegany counties. Snow showers were reported as far south as Charlottesville, Va. That's Frostburg State University's campus below.
The low reached 34 degrees here at The Sun. It was 31 out on the WeatherDeck in Cockeysville this morning. BWI Marshall reported a low of 30. But the mercury will be heading even lower tonight and tomorrow night. The forecast low overnight into Wednesday at BWI is 27 degrees, slipping to 24 degrees by Thursday morning. A 24-degree low on the 20th of November would be just two degrees short of the record low for the date - 22 degrees, set in 1951.
Daytime highs, meanwhile - even with partly to mostly sunny skies - will stick in the low 40s for most of the week, about 10 degrees below the long-term averages for Baltimore.
The next chance for precipitation looks like snow showers Sunday night, followed by rain showers on Monday.
With generally fair skies on tap, take a few moments as you drive home tonight, or while you walk the mutt, to seek out the planets Jupiter and Venus, now hanging bright and bold in the southwestern sky after sunset. That's jupiuter on the left, and somewhat brighter Venus on the left.
They are converging a bit each night, headed for a close conjunction witha slim crescent moon on Dec. 1. The movement will be quite obvious as the days go by, and the striking triple conjunction will catch the eyes of many who otherwise would never look up at night.
Comments
hi frank--
i'm an english major and this is my favorite 400 year old christmas card from will:
Winter
When icicles hang by the wall
And Dick the shepherd blows his nail
And Tom bears logs into the hall
And milk comes frozen home in pail,
When blood is nipp'd and ways be foul,
Then nightly sings the staring owl, Tu-whit;
Tu-who, a merry note,
While greasy Joan doth keel the pot.
When all aloud the wind doth blow
And coughing drowns the parson's saw
And birds sit brooding in the snow
And Marian's nose looks red and raw,
When roasted crabs hiss in the bowl,
Then nightly sings the staring owl, Tu-whit;
Tu-who, a merry note,
While greasy Joan doth keel the pot.
-- William Shakespeare
Posted by: Ronald Mardeusz | November 25, 2008 6:14 AM
p.s.
this was supposed to fly along at the end of my previous post . . .i don't know what happened--
it's at the end of "love's labour's lost" also a decent dvd if you get a chance to rent it.
i'm not familiar with that "quote" from the government fellows out at sterling as being attributable to the bard. perhaps they're just staying warm and hitting the nog a bit early.
Posted by: Ronald Mardeusz | November 25, 2008 9:28 AM