Hello darkness my old friend. Welcome to the shortest daylight of the year, the sun as low in the southern sky as it ever gets, shining directly on the Tropic of Capricorn at 9:03 a.m. Sunday.
For me the near-death experience we call “winter” isn’t about cold or snow but a lack of daylight — which can negatively affect people mentally and physically. We all fight the urge to hibernate in December. Eight hours, 46 minutes, 10 seconds of daylight Sunday. We pick up 46 seconds of daylight by New Year’s Day; 2 1/2 hours of additional daylight by Jan. 31.
Fun fact: Sunset times trend later three weeks earlier than sunrise trends earlier. Why? Two factors: an elliptical orbit of Earth around the sun and a 23.5-degree tilt of Earth’s axis.
A little ice is possible Sunday night, again Christmas Day up north. No big storms and with highs in the 30s all week we may have 1 to 2 inches on the ground Christmas morning.
Models hint at 40 degrees Christmas and New Year’s Eve. A numbing start to December and a melty finish? A wild example of weather whiplash.
