Sorry, that's eastern Colorado that had the big storm.

It was also the Front Range and the Denver area. We got 2 1/4 inches of rain within one day. The ground's still damp.

I moved here partially because Colorado does get so much sun. I do have SAD, and winters in Chicago made me want to jump off a bridge.

How did that happen, Lilacs!? Chicago Winters aren't much different from Spokane's and the year round average is the worse in the nation!! Once again, you would need to go to the far north to have less sun!!

I have to say that the selection of cities seems a little odd. NOAA would have additional data with days with clear skies but it isn't quite the same as HOURS of sun. For my part, I was beginning to suspect this might be true when I was looking at NOAA's Comparative Climatic Data.

I went to high school near Eureka, California. The 3 years that I lived there - it seemed like nearly every day was cloudy. But, I was looking at the comparison with Missoula, Montana and Lewiston, Idaho. And, here's Eureka with 5 & 6 clear days during the Winter months and then there's Lewiston and Missoula with 2 & 3 clear days each month. And, I'm going, "Whaaaa!?"

Apparently, I was more affected by gloom when I was a teenager. Thoughts of the Summer garden may have become more sustaining as I got older and stupider. Albert Camus said, "In the depth of winter, I finally learned that within me there lay an invincible summer." Personally, my birthday comes just after the Spring Equinox. I've considered putting road flares on the cake.

DigitS'

Sun! Gotta have sunshine! Must have sunshine! Even when it is below 0 and the sun is shining my attitude is good. No sun = bad mood. Could not live in the PNW. =/ Must have sun!

That's my opinion. ;) *chirp* *chirp*

Shelley, you mentioned Stephen somebody-or-other in an earlier message about "The Great American Desert." That piqued my curiosity so I had to look up the name (whatever it was, now you see how I keep myself entertained  forgetting and looking things up :o)

I wrote down something I found: "In the report that accompanied the map, the party's geographer, Edwin James, wrote of the region, ÂI do not hesitate in giving the opinion, that it is almost wholly unfit for cultivation, and of course, uninhabitable by a people depending upon agriculture for their subsistence. Although tracts of fertile land considerably extensive are occasionally to be met with, yet the scarcity of wood and water, almost uniformly prevalent, will prove an insuperable obstacle in the way of settling the country.Â"

Obviously, this guy was an idiot . . . evidenced by his employment of an oxymoron. How can you have a "prevalent scarcity" of anything? I mean, either something is prevalent or there is a scarcity.

Just my thought . . .

DigitSÂ
*sproing* *ging*

Well I have no scarcity at all of sun right now, and I'm craving it so much that I'm heading out into it right now!

Happy sunburn,
Skybird

Yes, Steve, Edwin James was the geographer and botanist on Stephen Long's expedition in 1820. They were the first white men to scale Pike's Peak.

This isn't particularly attractive country, but lovely on its own merits. An acquired taste to be sure with the lack of trees and endless expanses, but appealing in its own way. I hear what he was saying though, the scarcity of trees and bodies of water prevails across the plains. He did not realize the once abundant sources of ground water though. Scary that I get what he was saying, but I've read a lot of these historical accounts and they require attention because of the verbiage of the time, but quite interesting.

I love sun and fresh air. The more windows the better and have my bedroom window open even in the winter...just a bit in winter unless it is single digits and wind blowing like crazy.

This year was the worse though for winter blahs...less sun than remembered. I think a lot of us are chomping at the bit with finally getting beautiful sunny days in row. I'll take the rain as well.

The winter sun here in Colorado is definitely an improvement over Minnesota, where I'm from. But I had no idea that the Spokane area was way over on the other end of the spectrum. I remember an uncle who lived in Spokane and he said he missed the thunderstorms, which I thought was odd because I thought that anywhere that gets rain must get thunderstorms... Anyway, he never mentioned the lack of winter sun.

Well of course you have the consolation that you can grow Rhododendums and such while my choices are a bit more (ahem) shall we say 'limited' with regard to broad leafed evergreens? I have eleven varieties of Yuccas and I do like them, but I wouldn't mind a bit more variety. I have a Photinia that makes it through the winter looking decent, and an Arctostaphyllus (Manzanita) that stays pretty green. But oh my, all the other broad-leaved evergreens I've killed over the years...

That was an interesting link, Steve. Your long days of sun are coming:)

I do crave the sun. It's 79 degrees here right now at 10:30 in the morning. I climbed the Castle Rock with my dog early this morning and it was so beautiful. While hiking, I was pondered how less than one week ago it was snowing, almost blizzard like conditions with 13 inches of snow. Now it's all melted and everything is green. Crazy.

I've never lived somewhere with a lot of cloud cover but In So. Cal. we had June gloom (which usually started in May and continued off & on all summer) and I remember being affected by it as a kid. Not to mention in high school it made for bad hair by the time one finished walking to school; it was the 80's when big hair was it.

Having spent most of my summers in Colo. with my cousins growing up, I've always loved how it's sunny all day and then in the afternoon when it's good and hot, the clouds roll in, rain cools everything down and they roll on out leaving a beautiful sunset.

Happy days,

Charlene

Colorado certainly has entertaining weather. (I'm sure more so from close-up. ;o)

Shudavies, Spokane is at the edge of the Columbia Plateau and, out there somewhere are places like Hanford where less than 7 inches of precipitation fall each year. Cactus grows in some parts of Washington State. Spokane gets less than 20 inches and much of it falls as snow.

As Shudavies' uncle noticed, thunderstorms are not all that common. Seattle and Portland get the rain and what the interior gets is the overcast skies. And, as you move into the mountains in Idaho, there's a little more rain and snow but even less Winter sun. I really had no idea it was as "dark" as this chart shows.

I mean, the name "Spokane" is supposed to have something to do with "the children of the sun." Where we make up for it is in the Summer when high pressure finally builds on the Columbia Plateau and the daylight hours run on and on.

DigitS'