Southern California Storm

Tonight through Sunday, a big storm will unleash rain, mountain snow, and high wind over southern California. This latest storm, one that follows torrential rains that hit the area this week, is connected with the Full Moon of January 22nd.

As can be seen in the simplified astro-locality map at left, Jupiter was on the ascendant over the western United States at the time of full moon. Presently, Mercury is semi-square (45 degrees) Jupiter. Squares (90 degrees), semi-squares and ses-squares (135 degrees) are disruptive to the atmosphere. This is somewhat of a special case this time with Mercury since it is about to begin its retrograde movement. Because of this Mercury is lingering a bit longer in aspect to Jupiter than usual.

Mercury, which was rising over the Southeast U.S. at the time of
full moon, is having its own effect on the weather there. A weak area of low pressure is bringing rain there, while further north along the Mercury line a low pressure area will intensify over the Delmarva Peninsula generating high surf, gusty winds, and precipitation northward.

The Weather Alternative issued a forecast back in December for the period of January 23-27, 2008.

Forecast January 23-27, 2008

The eastern Plains and the Mississippi Valley are the focal points for severe weather during this five-day stretch. As is the case in most severe weather scenarios, warm and cold air masses collide resulting in storms. The 26th and 27th seem to be the most intense days.

The Weather Channel map at left for January 25th shows snow over Iowa, which moved through Illinois and Wisconsin. A wintry mix can be seen over Texas and the southern Plains into the Mississippi River Valley.

The Accuweather map at right is for the 23rd, which shows a low pressure system over the forecast area. The weather over these days was not as severe as anticipated.




February 2008 Weather Outlook
Some Observations About January's Weather Patterns 2008
Introduction to the Weather Alternative
How Long-Range Forecasts Are Made

Guan Zhuang Village

In the summer of 2002, I visited a home in the village. I wanted to learn how the Fangcheng fellowship, now estimated to number in the millions throughout China, had gotten started in this rural corner of Henan.

There were only six Christian believers in this village in the late 1960s, out of a population of close to two hundred. (Today, only three families in a village population of 170 are not Christians.) They began to meet secretly in homes for prayer and worship. Chen Yurong said her younger brother was a Communist Party official in the village who persecuted her fiercely. He had two boys, aged nine and five. One day, they were playing near the village well. Chen, at prayer not far away, felt an intense urge to go there, intuiting that one of her nephews might drown. As she approached, the nine-year-old cried in terror: his younger brother had fallen into the well. "Lord, save this boy! Let me die instead," Chen suddenly shouted out.

Somehow, as other villagers gathered around to see what they could do, the boy spluttered to the surface. Ropes were let down and he was pulled out. "Did you swallow a lot of water?" someone asked anxiously. "No," said the boy. "There was a man in white holding me up." After this, Chen's brother backed off from persecuting his sister.

Jesus in Beijing by David Aikman