Weather Watchers

I recall numerous cold snaps like this in the past. It's really a thing when you're out in the middle of Wyoming in a semi and your fuel lines freeze up, which I have experienced. What I noticed, as I was trying to fix the problem, was that even the antelope were huddling together to keep warm.

On nights like this, one can witness unusual phenomena that are magical and the stars are right there, clearer than ever. If there's any moisture in the air, it falls like glitter in a clear sky and any outdoor lights in the area take on the appearance of candles as the light from each one shoots a beam of whatever color it is into the sky. When looking at a town, it's like nothing else seen anywhere... all those beams going straight up and glitter falling, truly and experience.

But it's also the temp where steel breaks like thin ice and gasoline turns to jello, never mind grease for gears, that turns into concrete. On cold nights like this you can tell how cold it's getting by watching the behavior of the exhaust coming out of the tailpipe, it expands less and less until it starts to contract, that's also when it's time to find a safe indoor setting because that happens around-45F and colder. In some equipment, the exhaust pipe is right outside the window so you can see it, when it stops expanding it looks like a rope of smoke just laying out in the air as it comes out of the pipe like toothpaste emerging from the tube, just hanging there level.

Surreal.

It's now -28F and should come close to the predicted -31F (wind chill -50 or so) by daylight. Higher speed wind is coming so I'm still indoors until it brings in the warmer air that's definitely incoming. This is the worst of it for us at the westernmost margin of the air mass, should be getting above 0 by Tuesday.