Loose Ends: Blue skies few and far between

W  atching the news in the past few weeks, it was obvious that predicting the weather is more of an art than a science. They need to be able to predict blue sky, as so many of us simply take it for granted. Can’t you just picture it? The meteorologists would have more data to predict and probably a lot more phone calls about their errors. Our section of the state doesn’t fit the predictions of the Denver television stations very often, although it might be easy to predict blue sky more than precipitation. While northwest Colorado skies change color with the weather, the predominant shade is blue with lots of sunshine.“Do you ever get over the blueness of the sky?” is a common question from visitors from the sections of the country that have little sunshine and are used to seeing gunmetal gray over their heads. Those of us who have moved to the arid west never get over the quality and quantity of blue sky. The hope for a sunny, blue sky day is always there. Newcomers to our region often gain a new appreciation of the color of the sky. Most casual conversations about the weather don’t include that information. Remember the old country tune by Crystal Gale with the refrain, “Don’t it make your brown eyes blue?” There has to be a parody of that line and if there isn’t there will be soon, “Don’t it make your blue skies gray?” Usually weather talk is a great time-passer but it isn’t much more than that. When someone asks, “How’re you wintering?” they aren’t asking you how you liked the appearance of the weather fronts or the features of the last storm. When someone asks about the weather specifically, it’s usually related to a plan for traveling or going up in the high country. It isn’t until the area has been hit by more than the usual number of gray days that a form of weather fatigue sets in and threatens to stay through spring. While local weather stations collect all of the data reporting the snow depth and precipitation levels, no one has broken down the number of days that the sky is blue. It is about time.