Sunday, September 6, 2015

sunset denial

We all expected a spectacular sunset but it didn't happen and none of us could understand why not. The situation was right for it, super right for it in fact, an extra good layer of clouds from one end to the other as far as you can see all uniformly about 1,000 feet higher like a quilt of clouds viewed from the bottom that goes forever. All that water up there collecting, right there above our heads and the clouds so stingy with it. It could dump a flood any second but instead drizzles only faintly in and out sporadically. We watched the sun set, saw the light behind the clouds go lower, the sky go darker and that's all. No color light show. Just darkness from gray.

I figured out what happened.

The cloud quilt is so vast continuing west straight over the foothills,  covering evenly the mountains behind them and still just that evenly covering the mountains behind those, that it actually follows the curve of the earth at least the portion of arc of our viewing, to the end of the state perhaps, maybe even through Utah. The sun never does slip under the clouds, can never illuminate from beneath them as usual so it stays concealed behind the cloud screen all the way down to darkness. Our down. The clouds could clear by the time the edge of night reaches California where the clouds may break and the sun shine through beneath as it as the earth rotates away from it.

These are somebody else's clouds I'm using to show the sun going down with no color, like Planet Dreary.


The next day, yesterday, breaks in the cloud cover allow the usual glorious thing. With the window open the light show demands your attention. 


Conclusion: No breaks in clouds mean dreary sunsets.  

7 comments:

Lem the artificially intelligent said...

You got to hack the clouds Chip.

rcommal said...

"You got to hack the clouds Chip."

Chip Ahoy said...

Thank you for that, rcommal, that is the ODDEST thing I ever stuck with, really very odd. Everything about it is odd and I didn't realize how truly great the whole thing is until the very end. I was confused all the way through until the very end. That's Ann Margaret innit. Finally. At last I understand what the big dealio is with her. How very odd. And the thing ends with all that talent, truly, it is real talent, used up doing a ridiculous chicken squawk dance choreography.

I sensed in that video Ann Margaret the daughter of one of the Dancing Moms. I knew girls take dance class because I hung out with dancers awhile I imagined them ballet classes with dance bars going around the room, not anything like the cable show. Those girls on the show are like younger versions of the kids I palled around with that why they interest me so much but they were ballet athletes by then and not involved in any videos that I knew about. If Ann Margaret were growing up today she would match the girls on Dance Moms who move into video and music production. They dance like this. All these dancers do. Where did they come from back then? It must have been a similar thing. Man, she is good. She's spot on, tiptoe perfect through the whole thing even though the choreography is purposefully odd and the segues from one style to another nonexistent or ridiculous, the dancers handle the craziness demanded of them perfectly, odd costuming, odd dance moves, odd choreography, impressive routine-mastering dancing that changes the whole art and what follows it.

That had to have been 60 coat-shoppings with my mother ago. Recycled to Goodwill ages ago, picked up again, used again and discarded again a previous century in fact. Like right when color film was possible, that long ago.

bagoh20 said...

We spent 3 days last week in Estes Park, CO - driving around, hiking and relaxing. Absolutely beautiful country, and so much open space. We loved it. I could live there (during summer anyway).

Joe Biden, America's Putin said...

It's wind and rain today - with some blue sky.

I hope you and your gal had fun, Bags. Got photos? did you do any fun hikes?

I accomplished 2 more 14ers over the weekend. Cameron and Lincoln. Should have finished Bross, but I was cold and exhausted.... and ready for banana cake.

rcommal said...

I'm no Ann-Margret (even though, it is true, I don't dislike Ann-Margret, and, in fact, have always thought she was terrific, no matter that I'm not like her; also, I've never had a problem with men seeing her as the fabulous, sexy gal she not just personified, but was). Also, I never sought a Conrad Birdie. Also, I never dissed the sort of guy whom I wanted to marry, not to mention did.

Sharp folks would already know all of that...

...had they been paying attention, all of these years.



rcommal said...

Chip:

Five-days-a-week dance lessons, of whatever number of half-hours or hours, as a general rule which naturally applies ruthlessly to most people, will never make up enough for lacking a fundamental understanding of music.

Dislike all you like the purpose to which all that talent was put toward in the film-clip video to which I linked, the truth is that all of those people weren't just trained dancers (though they were!!). They were skilled listeners of music.