You should enjoy today, because it’s going to be a while before we see this kind of warmth again. More snow melted my yard, although I still have a solid foot in most of the front and about 6 to 8 inches of it on the back.

There will be significant snow loss through tomorrow mid-day before the pace of melting slows to a crawl for much of next week. It could even go in the other direction for some inland and mountain areas! Skiers rejoice.

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Sunshine is most evident over central Maine, but there will be increasing amounts of it this afternoon. I expect 60F or higher to be common over many areas.

Tonight the moon is almost full. I think there will be too many clouds to see it, but there is an eclipse tomorrow morning as the moon is setting. It’s unfortunate we are missing another astronomical event due to weather. It seems like this happens a lot around here.

Moon Driven Holidays
The next week is big for Christians and Jews alike. I always like the Passover-Easter time period. Since both religions use the moon to calculate the holidays, most of the time they fall very close together.

On the Jewish calendar, this is Nissan or the 7th month. Passover begins on the 15th day this month and ends on the 21st or 22nd depending on how you practice Judaism.. Since Hebrew days begin and end at sundown, Passover begins at sundown on the preceding day or tonight.

For western Christians, Easter is calculated as the first Sunday after the paschal full moon that occurs on or after the vernal equinox. The moon is full tomorrow, thus Easter is Sunday. There is some nuance to the date, however. The Western church actually uses a fixed date (March 21) for spring, which in reality floats between the 20th and 21st. And by full moon it does not mean the astronomical full moon but the “ecclesiastical moon,” which is based on tables created by the church. All this allow the date to be set easier.

For the Orthodox Church, Easter is April 12th this year or a week later. The Orthodox Church uses the same formula to calculate Easter, but bases the date on the Julian calendar instead of the calendar that is most widely used today, the Gregorian one. This means both churches only occasionally celebrate Easter on the same day.

Tomorrow is a transitional day. Below is a temperature map for 1PM Saturday. Notice the pocket of mild air over southern areas, but the cold air (20 degrees colder) is to the north.

During the day a chilly flow will move through the region and temperatures which will feel mild early will be more winter-like by sunset. Most areas will be several degrees below freezing by tomorrow evening.

It’s bright and sunny to start Easter. There is another system which will move in Sunday night and early Monday along with some light rain or snow showers through Monday morning. It becomes briefly milder Monday afternoon, but cold and damp or even wet weather resumes much of next week.

As we all know, if you have lived here for a couple of years or more, spring really never arrives, we just sort of go from cold and wet to hot and humid. This might be one of those years.

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