It has been a long winter. With temperatures running a good 10 - 20 degrees below normal for the past two months, spring arrives in a big way today and with it will come smoky air. With this city's many bonfire burners not having burned for 5 months or longer, there is a lot of pent-up pyromania that will be unleashed probably as soon as tonight as the temperature is forecast to reach 70 today. Most of the snow we got this past Tuesday has melted and the ground may be a little soft, but that will not stop burners in this town. The rule of living in North St. Paul is that if the weather is nice enough to open the windows in the evening, you will not be able to because the air will be smoky.
Winter is the least smoky season in North St. Paul, MN. As with most winters, the evening air was smoky half or a little more of the time in November and December but after the new year arrives, recreational fireplace use drops. From December through last week the air was smoky at 7 AM only twice all winter. After the new year, we had very little smoke in the evening air. It was nice to go outside and take a deep breath of clean, fresh air which is something we usually cannot do in this city because of all the nightly burning.
I believe the last time I looked at this blog or checked my emails was last November. I really neglected this blog last year and did not make regular updates as I have been since spring 2008 when this blog was started. As a result of not posting regularly, the number of visitors to this blog in 2012 dropped by well over 3,000 visitors from 2011. I still have all the burning data in my notepad and I will update for 2012 soon.
I have dozens of emails to read through so that may take me a few days. I am back and soon the smoke pollution will be back as it always is.