Winterstorm coming

I could tell that a storm was about to hit shortly after sunrise.  The sky looked ominous. Dark grey clouds were over the mountains and cold, strong winds began to blow, slapping the dogs in their faces with cold rain.  I quickly aborted the walk after just 0.6 miles.  Snow above 8000' will fall later today.  I'm so glad I had the opportunity to make it to Tucson and back yesterday without any issue.  This is not the kind of weather I enjoy driving in.

Rain began to fall steadily by 8am, and then rather heavily an hour later.  This heavy rain lasted all morning, flooding the yard.  Not even the dogs wanted to go outside, but at least they all had that short opportunity to relieve themselves when it wasn't raining!

It finally stopped raining early in the afternoon.  I took the dogs down to the river.   The horse corrals along E Waters Road were flooded. Birds of all sizes were flitting about, as if the rain brought on new life for all living things. Susan was busy packing for her trip to California tomorrow so I went alone, taking the dogs around the field and along the river.  The river was flowing strongly like milk chocolate.  Only Minnie wanted to go into the water, but quickly got out when she realized how strong the current was.  Her 94 pounds give her leverage that the more slender dogs don't have.

The leaves on the ground helped the mud from making the walk near the river treacherous.  There were only a few very wet areas away from the flowing creek, but I didn't want to linger long.  I made everyone walk at a steady pace around the field.  The mountains were still shrouded, but I could see in a break in the clouds that snow above 7000' had fallen.

Any beach along the river that I was able to walk on just a few days ago was now gone.  This water is good news for all life that depends on it (and what does not depend on water), which means I can take the dogs down to the river a month from now and they will be able to play in it.

I made it back home by 3pm.  Now the mountains were more visible.  The snow will melt in a week, filling the washes again with water.  The storm came at a good time for us: no danger of wildfires now!

I was able to pull out a big bag of weeds from the yard that were hardened to the ground just a few days ago.  Weather going forward for ten days looks colder but not yet freezing.  Highs will be in the 50s, low in the 30s.