It doesn't rain as much as you'd think

At several points in the past few months I've posted pictures on facebook showing something I saw that caught my eye. On more than one occasion people have cracked a joke about how sunny it is in the picture.

I get the feeling that people in the US think it is gloomier in Edinburgh than it really is.

Over the past month, in an effort to not feel trapped in my office all day, I like to eat my lunch on a bench somewhere nearby. During this time, there have only been 2-3 days where I couldn't do this because of rain. Is balmy and warm when I sit outside? Not in the California sense of balmy and warm, but we are quite a bit further north than California, so it wouldn't be expected to be t-shirt weather in September (although it's supposed to be t-shirt weather tomorrow).

I found a chart that listed the number of rainy days in Edinburgh per month. It looks like it's about 1/2 the days, but there's rain and then there's rain. Most of the rain we get is not like a Baltimore thunderstorm on an August evening, or like the California winter rains that come in January or February. Most of the rain is more like a drizzle, or a light shower, that doesn't go on all day. There have been quite a few days where I've been walking around, on a sunny day, and have felt a drizzle, sometimes lasting 15-20 minutes. Days like that are great for rainbows, and I don't think most people would consider that a rainy day, but I'm sure it's listed as one.

Are there clouds in the sky in Edinburgh? Of course, but they are not gray all the time, as people may believe. We don't live in a gloomy, depressing city. I'm looking outside right now and I see white clouds, and a blue sky. Today is the kind of day people in East Lansing, Michigan look for on a football Saturday - a crisp day where it's cool enough to be jacket weather, but not cold enough to be coat weather; where it's warm enough to enjoy a football game, but not so warm that you want to leave after the first quarter.

Is the weather always like this? Of course not. You can't expect to have great weather all the time - no one can. We have bad days and good days; we have sunny days and rainy days; we have cold days and warm days (though never as warm or as cold as the mid-Atlantic states).

a rainbow in a moment of sun, cloud, and drizzle (photo by Lauren Hall-Lew)

Edinburgh is probably not the city you think it is, weather wise; it doesn't rain as much as you'd think.

10 years is a long time

I was watching the news today, talking about 9/11, and how people on United 93 called their family members. I only got my first mobile phone a few months before 9/11. At the time, I was surprised to learn that phones would be able to get a signal mid-flight. Ten years is long time.

I don't want to talk about what I did that day - everyone has their story, and I see no need to tell you mine. What I'm most struck by today, is just how different my life is now than it was then.

Ten years ago....

I hadn't started teaching at De Anza, I hadn't started the PhD I never finished, and I hadn't even thought of getting the MBA that I did finish.

I didn't have dreadlocks 10 years ago, and had no plans to grow them out again (I was in the 3-year hole between both rounds of dreads). I had no chickenpox scars, hadn't separated the shoulder that bothers me every time I go to the gym, had no idea how painful lower back pain could be, and I had only one tattoo.

I didn't know my wife existed ten years ago, much less that she would end up being from my father's home town. I didn't have any siblings-in-law ten years ago; two fewer people who called me 'uncle', one more person that called me 'grandson', and one more person who called me their son.

I wonder where life will take me in the next 10 years.

Fi with uncle Jeff (2002)

Maya with uncle Jeff (2008)