C For Ceiling

Day 81: There are a number of different versions of the mnemonic for "stalactite" versus "stalagmite." I learned it as "C for ceiling, G for ground," i.e., "stalaCtite" as opposed to "stalaGmite." Did you know that there is a related term for the structure created when the two of them meet? Oh, you could call them "pillars" or "columns" and be equally correct, but I much prefer the less frequently used word "stalagnate." I have examples of all three, rendered in sparkling ice, on the various corners of my house. It is a less-than-optimum condition, and unless I had taken up a vigil outdoors overnight, unpreventable. The best I can do at this point is knock them free and hope that the gutters and downspouts are up to the task ahead of them. Temperatures have crept above 32 degrees, and snow level is predicted to rise to 3500 feet mid-week. Is a flood next on the list of PNW weather events? Time will tell.

C For Ceiling

Day 158: "C for ceiling, G for ground." That's the mnemonic my mother taught me to help me remember where the base of a stala-C-tite or a stala-G-mite was rooted. There are variations to this simple memory aid, but it's surprising the number of people who refer to either formation as a "stalactite" regardless of its roots.

The Longmire ice stalactites have fallen thick and fast under this recent spell of summery weather. The roof "glacier" has retreated into non-existence from the Administration Building porch and the deadly sharp icicles have dropped from the eaves to collect in piles of brittle jackstraws at the foundation. I haven't heard any reports of visitors being impaled, but the obliviously curious may just have been the lucky sort.

It's a little weird here at home, stepping out the back door into 70 degrees to find snow still lingering in the shady spots of the yard. Up against the woods, it's still several inches deep, confusing the current invasion by Robins who expected to find bugs in the freshly turned soil of spring molehills. That said, it won't last long. Next up is a round of rain, something we hope is confined to the lowlands lest it inspires a flood of melt from the masses of snow in the high country.