Valentine's Day After Rams Win the Super Bowl! Snow Cover Across the US... While Day Lillies Pop Up Around Town. Why Weather and Geography Always Matter in Miami or the Carolinas or Russia.

 

Today's satellite imagery above.

The cold came back.... 

..... like the cat!

Snow cover on the top.... up where it belongs.

But, cold temperatures invaded the South!

It'll warm up fast in the South..

Thursday it's forecast to be 74 degrees again!

Tug of War between Winter and Spring!!

That is really a beautiful front that swept all the way down into the Caribbean. It's too early to talk on the tropics, but it does make me wonder how long we will have cold fronts sweeping down past Havana this year and at some point if we will see early development along these decaying, frontal boundaries as so often happens early in the season.  Long paragraph to basically say that nothing is happening in the tropics yet, but I'm watching patterns and enjoying those last wintry blasts of cold air before Spring springs forth! I saw these little yellow daylillies or whatever they are called pushing up through the ground on the way to the synagogue this past Saturday. I always thought of them as tulips, because I didn't know much about Spring flowers growing up in the land where hibiscus bloom 365 days a year. But, when you see them you know that Spring can't be far away.  You can also buy them at Trader Joes! 

The Rams won the Super Bowl!

Amazingly it almost went into Over Time!

But it didn't and it was a close game.

In High School we called that Ram Power.

Because I was a Ram!!

Looks like a heart, doesn't it?

And, as Y'all know I love LA!

Blurry picture of me, my mother and my brothers. Note I'm wearing school colors, which I rarely wore as I'm not really a gold or yellow person but sometimes you gotta show some school spirit ...ya know? I found it over the weekend in a small box with some pictures my mother had ripped out of the family photo album. She was moody like that... I think we were showing off a bougainvillea plant that bloomed in the winter. You can tell it's winter, because I'm wearing jeans not a short skirt and she had on long sleeves. Weather once again dictates everything from our wardrobe to why nations often go to war!

It was a great school where I had good friends and happy times. Okay, I was fairly popular and overly involved in activities, clubs, parties and AP classes! It's always good to have a well balanced mix of fun along with advanced learning classes. I took a lot of History and English, I bet you aren't surprised...  It kind of looks like a yellow heart if you blur your eyes, so it made total sense I spent a good part of my life in LA where the Rams played!  (enough on the Rams.... )

This is a map of the world from the top of the North Pole looking down. No, it's not Christmas yet so keep working on that list for Santa. Note how America in the North American Continent has green mixed with white and the areas that are green will soon move into their annual growing season where we produce lots of wheat, oats, soy, corn and that keeps us flush in Cheerios! Seriously though, we have quite the charmed life as the warm, humid winds from the Gulf of Mexico deliver one tropical wave after another that didn't make it to Hurricane fame, but did make it to Kansas! The Coastal Plain of the Carolinas, Georgia and parts of Virginia also provide a bounty of produce that bolsters our ability to get fresh fruit and vegetables fairly cheap. There's nothing like a summer drive through these regions stopping at farm stands and buying berries, peaches and whatever else calls to you!

Up close and very in your face..........

...you see that most of Russia has SNOW.

Oh over near Ukraine they aren't covered currently.

Russia does NOT have a great growing season.

But hey they do the best they can... 

This is the real message of today's weather blog and I want you to remember it always. Climate and geography always matter in the world of Economics and Political Science. Countries did not go to war because they wanted to get their hands on a few weeks worth of Day Lillies, not they did not. They went to war over natural resources and often for ethnic reasons that had to do with where borders were or were not and their collective history of that region. 

It's funny in a world where Globalism is so important as a goal by many, many territorially look " and say "that was our land for hundreds of years, it's Russia and we want it back" and others say "oh wait but they declared independence and for the last 20 years they have been trying to get their groove going politically most recently electing a famous Reality TV start who had little experience in business nor politics, though he does have a degree from a University in some form of Economics.  Politics is strange. Geography, Climate and History are less strange and very simple. 

The Ukraine is a large country filled with different ethnicities and in the East it's mostly Russian (along with some Turkish and various descendents of Greeks who colonoized the region. My mother's paternal family lived there for a while before running away from the Cossacks who liked to get drunk and kill whatever population was there that was not originally from there and that was often the wandering Jews who wandered in from somewhere in Russia. So they ran away to Philadelphia before moving South to Florida where my mother's side of the family had been since the 1800s living in Key West and Tampa. 

History has to do with geography, both family wise and other wise. I had a Great, Great Grandfather who had asthma and liked Sea Travel.... and Key West called his name for health reasons first and then because he fell in love with it. 

What's your history? 

Praying for peace, obviously, however I don't think that much military power has moved from all parts of the European/Asian arena just to keep the peace. And, pretty sure Russia would like what it considers their land back and only time will tell if they can all work something out peacefully. Time is running out.

Lastly we have Valentine's Day! It's a nice day filled with roses or Irises or whatever flower is in bloom or in the store that you love the most. South American flowers make a long trek to usually Florida where the flowers are then sent out to Flower Shops to sell flowers in the middle of the winter to cheer up someone who is much loved and thought about. Boxes of candy are passed around and well what's better than popping candy kisses into your mouth or a big box of Godiva. Sadly, most Godiva stores in my area no longer are in my local Malls. The world has changed so much over the last few years. I do hope you enjoy Valentine's Day and actually every day as every day has promise and potential and something to gaze at that gives you pleasure if you only look out the window, take a walk or a road trip. 

According to Wikipedia, and they know everything, it could be celebrated on July 6th but it is not in America which is kind of sad as you'd think Mid Summer would be a much nicer time to take your girl to the beach and make out on the sand before taking a swim together or getting drinks at a near by Tiki Bar. Just saying......   

Also please rememebr the Patron Saint is also the patron saint of beekeepers so ... go find your honey and enjoy the day!

Much love....

Thanks for reading along....

Sometimes writing this blog is a personal therapy for me ... 

I love geography and weather, but my degree that I received with honors and actually cash awards as well as offers to work for the CIA (that I declined) was in International Relations, emphasis on Russian Studies in a Post WW2 World so I am acutely interested in what is going on currently in the ever changing history of Europe. That leaves me with one odd piece of trivia that everyone forgets and that is that Europe is a Peninsular! Russia is the Eastern backbone of that Peninsular as it is hogging up two continents both Europe and Asia! 

If you're still reading this............... Thank You! Give yourself a Valentine's Day Present today!

I needed to write and writing is a form of therapy and there are no hurricanes to write about today so here we are rambling like a rambling rose.

Besos BobbiStorm

@bobbistorm on Twitter and Instagram

Weather mostly on Twitter and Whatever on Instagram.

Ps... Enjoy the beautiful song and dance. I studied dance too... lots and lots of dance! Forgive the typos today as therapy doesn't need an editor!