You know what the farmers say...

...they say "it always rains after a dry spell."

I wish it would rain here.  We had just the barest sprinkle last Saturday, not even enough to settle the dust, but prior to that it has been since November - just 20mm then in two lots of 10mm, but really it hasn't rained as such since early September (data from BOM).  The pic above shows rain earlier this year on Uluru, and of course Australian readers at least will know of the huge flooding rains across the Eastern seaboard and adjacent inland parts.  Inland WA and further East in the Wheatbelt has had some good rain too.  Bugger all here though.  The clouds and humidity are such a tease, just like the 0.2mm we had on Saturday.

Did you know, and this is true the world over, that farmers always complain less about the weather in February?  This is because there are fewer days in February.

I am a little bit of a weather nerd, I get it from my dad.  As a young man who had been a bit of a jack-of-all-trades, and had recently completed a teaching and mathematics degree but seemingly wasn't ready to settle into the career path just yet, he responded to an advertisement in the newspaper.  It essentially was asking for field hands with lots of different skills to man an Antarctic expedition.  This was 1956 or 57, I think, very early days in the whole Antarctica thing.  The slot available was for a meterologist/general hand, and he went for it, doing a crash course as what he always referred to as a "weather guesser."  Now that's a whole set of stories I suppose.

He passed on his continuing passion for weather guessing to me.  It is of jack-all practical use except to be able to see certain types of cloud and know to get under cover *immediately* and be able to understand what Russell Woolf is talking about with his synoptic charts, barometric pressures and satellite images.  I must admit I do sometimes make the occasional quiet bet with myself against the BOM's predictions and every now and then get one right.  Mostly not though - damn, they're getting good.

This is Russell.  He looks happy.  He usually does.

This is not Russell.  But I can see how you got confused there.

On the other hand, the sheer incomprehensibility (I wonder if my new iPhone speaking program will be able to say "incomprehensibility"?) and power of our incredible atomsphere and its interactions with the harder and wetter stuff all about us never ceases to totally amaze and inspire me.

Meeta is a bit the same.  Over the last few years especially, she has turned into a little bit of a storm nerd.  Storm junkie might be a better term.  If there's a cyclone anywhere near our region she's on to it, same if theres an especially interesting or just big and kick-arse storm anywhere else.  So I get to hear all about it too, and frankly, some of this stuff is mind-bendingly fascinating.  But I won't tell her secrets.  Just to say, it's actually a super thing to share, even if I don't talk much about it.  Or talk much at all, I suppose :-)

So come on!  Send 'er down, Hughie!  If any of you have a spare moment, please help send some lovely cooling cloud and precipitation our way, because I really, really want that moment of going outside and getting soaked in a downpour.  We can do this people, I'm sure of it.

Thanks.