almost the driest year ever...

Thanks to the rain today 2007 was able to avoid being the driest year ever in Atlanta and in Athens!

At Hartsfield-Jackson we picked up 1.30" of rain. For 2007 we ended up with 31.85" of rain compared to the 31.80" be saw in 1954. We can thank the month of December for helping us avoid the dubious distinction. We were 1.10" above average this month.

Although it is something to be excited about, the fact remains that 2007 was the 2nd driest year ever and we are still in an 'Exceptional' drought as you can see on the map above.

Lets hope for a continuation of December's wet spell in 2008.


Happy New Year!


--Chris

they look familiar...

Have you ever been told you look like a celebrity? I think we all have. Sometimes you are left scratching your head wondering what they are seeing that looks similar and other times there is some resemblance.

Some people have said that I look like Prince William or Rick Schroeder or that funny guy (French Stewart) from that 90s sitcom, Third Rock From The Sun.

A few weeks ago a friend of mine posted something cool from a website where it supposedly compares your faces to a similar celebrity and morphs between the two. It says it diagnosed your features and those of a celebrity and comes up with a match.

I thought it would be fun to run this matching and morphing website on the members of the StormTracker46 Weather Team.

Here is what the website came up with for Gene Norman. Not sure about this one. I do not think I even know who this guy is!

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Laura Huckabee's is pretty good. Needless to say, being compared to Amanda Peet is not a bad thing! :-)
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Finally, I am supposed to resemble John Ritter. Kinda funny. If Gene was a girl, technically the weather team would kinda like Three's Company!
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I hope you enjoy it. Have fun with it!


--Chris

remember those that serve...

During the holiday season it can be difficult to be away from friends and family. My wife and I were not around family today because I was working. That being said, we were lucky enough to see our families last week when we were on vacation. That is not the case with everyone... especially our troops who are serving our country overseas. :-)

Here at CBS46 we are missing one of our family members and I know his family is missing him. Our weather producer, Greg Majewski, is currently serving our country overseas in Kuwait and Iraq.

While it was easy to miss family because I had to work today, my wife and I made sure to count our blessings and think about what it would be like to not be able to see any family this holiday season!

Because the holiday season is so difficult for troops overseas, all the employee's at CBS46 did our best to let him know we were thinking of him. We sent nearly 40 lbs of snacks and various items reminding him of home. You can see Greg with his stash in the picture above.

As for Greg, I know he is counting down the days until his 2 week leave later in January. Can't wait to see ya buddy!


--Chris

wish book....

Remember the Sears wish book? It has probably been 15 years since I have seen one. I went to the Sears website today to see and I guess you can technically still order one, but with the technology of the internet and computers today I am sure it is not the same as it used to be.

I can remember each year when our wish book arrived in the mail. My sister and I would carefully go through and dog ear the pages of the stuff we wanted from Santa. During the weeks leading up to Christmas I probably went through and that book a million times adjusting my list over and over.

What do kids do these days I wonder? I suppose they 'bookmark' the links to the various items they want on the computer. Highly effective, but certainly not the same! There is a whole world of stuff out there to look at. The wish book consolidated it to a few hundred pages and that was more than enough!

I can remember when Transformers were the big toy and I certainly had my share. As I write this, I found a scanned page from the 1985 wish book. I can remember the layout of the Transformers. Absolutely perfect. Whoever designed it is obviously a genius! :-) The funny thing is, I had every Transformer in that add other than the dress up kit and the mat the kid was playing on!!! What a neglected kid I was! :-)

I admit that I have done a good amount of my shopping on line because of the convenience, but I do not know if there will ever be anything as great as the Sears Wish Book. I hope when I have kids some day that the Wish Book will still be around so I can teach them the art of dog earring the pages to create the perfect wish list!

I am working Christmas week, but this may be my last entry before Christmas. I am off this coming week to go visit my mom and dad in Florida and my wife's family in South Georgia. So in case it is... here is a look at our Christmas card for this year as well as the tree in our apartment.

Happy Holiday's to you and your family,


--Chris

Geminid Meteor Shower

For all you start gazers, you should have a pretty good chance to see some Geminid meteors tonight or tomorrow night across the metro area. The only thing that could hamper your viewing... clouds. I think that skies should clear out some by Friday night and there will still be some meteors to see... so be patient if we do not have any breaks overnight tonight!

The best time though for viewing will be late tonight and early Friday morning. As far as where to look... look toward the planet Mars. Right now the constellation Gemini is near Mars and the Geminid meteors appear from the constellation of Gemini. Mars is a bright yellow-orange looking 'star' and shines in the eastern sky during the evening hours.

The best time to see the most Geminids will be around 2am, but there will still be some you can see as early as 9 or 10pm or as late as sunrise. The two things that will help your viewing will be to get away from the city and its light pollution. Also, the moon is fairly small right now so moonlight will not be much of an issue.

As far as how many Geminids you will see, expect to see 1-3 meteors per minute!

For more the meteor shower and all things celestial. Feel free to visit this handy website... SkyandTelescope.com


--Chris

Record Weekend...

This has been a weekend where we have seen several records fall here in metro Atlanta...

The first record dealt with our rainfall deficit. For the first time ever, we saw our annual (January-December) rainfall deficit climb over 20"!

The other record dealt with the temperature... as we shattered the old record of 71 set back in 1978 with our high of 76 Sunday.

Needless to say, so far this weekend the temperatures have felt nothing like December. I was walking around Atlantic Station today doing some shopping before I came into work and I saw a lot of short sleeve shirts and even a few shorts!!!

More record high temperatures and record high rainfall deficits will be set over the days ahead.

Here is a look at the record highs...

Monday: 74 1972
Tuesday: 73 1975
Wednesday: 77 1981

Monday and Tuesday's records are the most likely to be broken.

Now, as far as rainfall, none is expected until probably Thursday.

So, if you are out and about over the days ahead, leave the umbrella at home and you might want to amend that Christmas wish list to include a few summer items!


Have a great week!



--Chris