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All posts for the month November, 2010

I thought it would be fitting to share A Thanksgiving Forecast, given that it’s just about that time of the year.

Turkeys will thaw in the morning, then warm in the oven to an afternoon high near 190 F. The kitchen will turn hot and humid, and if you bother the cook, be ready for a severe squall or cold shoulder.

During the late afternoon and evening, the cold front of a knife will slice through the turkey, causing an accumulation of one to two inches on plates. Mashed potatoes will drift across one side while cranberry sauce creates slippery spots on the other. Please pass the gravy.

A weight watch and indigestion warning have been issued for the entire area, with increased stuffiness around the beltway. During the evening, the turkey will diminish and taper off to leftovers, dropping to a low of 34 F in the refrigerator.

Looking ahead to Friday and Saturday, high pressure to eat sandwiches will be established. Flurries of leftovers can be expected both days with a 50 percent chance of scattered soup late in the day. We expect a warming trend where soup develops. By early next week, eating pressure will be low as the only wish left will be the bone.

Have a Happy Thanksgiving everyone!

Before I get into the top 5 driest and wettest U.S. major cities, here’s a brief idea of how I collected the data. First, the cities must have a population size of 100,000 or more. Second, populations are not added for a site that has multiple city names. For example, Seattle-Tacoma just goes as Seattle for this list, and just uses the Seattle population to determine if it is a major city. Also, the city must have an official National Weather Service reporting site. Finally, if a city has multiple NWS sites, I use the one that seems to be the most official, usually the one that is listed first on the NWS observed weather reports pages. If you have any questions/comments about my method, feel free to leave a comment on this post.

Now for the lists. Data is from November 7th.

Driest Major U.S. Cities
Rank City Precipitation
1 Las Vegas, NV 4.12
2 Honolulu, HI 5.26
3 Bakersfield, CA 5.84
4 El Paso, TX 6.51
5 Palmdale, CA 7.31

Wettest Major U.S. Cities
Rank City Precipitation
1 San Juan, PR 78.67
2 Miami, FL 63.76
3 Fort Lauderdale, FL 58.27
4 Wilmington, NC 54.39
5 Mobile, AL 54.31

I’ll try to get updates going each week depending on how the statistics change.

Have a great week everyone!

If you had been celebrating Daylight Saving Time in North America, remember to change your clocks back one hour this weekend.

Since it is November, I’m sure we’ll begin tracking snowfall for the 2010-11 season very soon. Will Syracuse repeat, or will a different city take the title of snowiest major U.S. city? Stay with Golden Snow Globe throughout the season to see which cities start off on top and if they can stay there for the season.

In addition, one of my personal goals is to have updates on the wettest and driest major U.S. cities. If all goes well, I should be able to get an update up this weekend. I plan on posting the top 5 of each every weekend from now until the end of the year, when the stats are reset. Once 2011 begins, those updates will be less frequent.

Also, don’t forget about the Golden Snowball contest, which involves five of the Upstate New York cities Albany, Binghamton, Buffalo, Rochester and Syracuse.

Have a great weekend everyone and enjoy the upcoming snow season!