Wednesday, 23 January, 2002

Hey! I forgot to tell you about one of the things I saw on my trip. Not once, but twice, I saw the "Green Flash" at sunset. I have been looking for the green flash for years, have never seen one, and now I've seen it twice. I was beginning to think it was an urban legend - or in this case the Caribbean island version of urban.

What's a green flash? Here's a simplistic description:

"The green flash is an astronomical, or rather, an atmospheric, event. When conditions are right, at the last moment of the setting Sun, its upper edge or limb blazes with an emerald green color for a few seconds before disappearing below the horizon. Few people have seen the green flash, yet it is one of the most startling and colourful of sunset or sunrise phenomena, requiring patience and good luck to be seen."

For those of you who want the whole shebang explanation, you can check out M. M. Dworetsky's website. Oh, and here's a picture of one for those with shorter attention spans:

[No, I didn't take it. Well, I did, in the sense that I swiped it from a Mr. Andrew T. Young's website, but...]

Anyway, it was very cool, and I'm sure you all can sleep better at night knowing that they do in fact exist, and are not just pointless rumor.

Speaking of pointless rumor - well, no actually, I just needed some sort of transition to get from green flashes to THE HOUSE. Although, perhaps pointless rumor isn't such a bad term for that either. Maybe I should name it, kind of like an Olde English Estate. Far Meadows, Willow Manor, Pointless Rumor. Or an Italian Villa: Superflua La Voce.

Wait, wait. . . where was I going with this?? Oh yes - I have new pictures of THE HOUSE. I actually have a couple of newer pictures showing it without the "No Smoking" steel beam, but they're still in the camera. Now why don't I just get a digital camera and be able to include new pictures without having to wait until the roll is finished?

[Note to Mom and Dad: No, you may not buy me a digital camera. But thank you anyway.]

I'm afraid it's going to be a short entry today. It's almost 6:00 and I realize that I forgot to eat lunch today - my stomach is making some rather rude noises. Best tend to it, methinks.

Quote du jour:

"The sunset caught me,
turned the brush to copper,
set the clouds
to one great roof of flame
above the earth."

-- Elizabeth Coatsworth (1893 - 1986)

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