Daleville (1/29/2014)

This week I was teaching in the Roanoke area, and having the winter from hell, it snowed.  I was in Daleville, just northwest of Roanoke at the Greenfield Training Center.  Thank goodness we only had 2 inches, while at my home in Yorktown we had 6 inches or more.  This was the view from the window of my classroom.  Such a beautiful view was almost distracting while teaching my class, but I behaved and paid attention to what I had to say.  I took this photo between sessions of my class.

Daleville is surprisingly nice.  It seems to be an up and coming community which you can only appreciate once you get of the Interstate.  The even have few decent restaurants and a great coffee shop.  Altogether a fun stay.

Snow in the Yorktown area (1/21/2014)

Boy it was cold this morning (12 degrees F).  It has snowed some and the temperatures had dropped dramatically. his picture is of the same pond as always, early in the morning as the sun came up.  Beautiful sight.

York River (1/17/2014)

Having a day off I got up early to take a few sunrise pictures along the Colonial Parkway.  Yes, the State Virginia gives off on the Friday before the Martin Luther King Holiday as Lee/Jackson Day.

This picture had not much to do with sun rise but I just loved the ice on the pole and the colors so close to sunup.  A second one show the sun rising behind the bridge.

Richmond (1/16/2014)

It has been snowing this morning in Richmond.  In Yorktown (where I live) there was no precipitation at all, but interestingly here in downtown Richmond there was a little.  Some of the cars coming in had two or three inches on top of them.  A person in the elevator told me that they had 3 inches at her home and was surprised that there was hardly any downtown (she said she lives in Richmond).  Looking outside my office window, the roofs are somewhat covered with snow.

Somehow this covering of the black roofs took me back to a discussion in the environmental movement some years in the past.  The idea was that white roofs would slow down global warming, or at least the heat island effect of larger downtown areas.  Back then it sounded like an interesting concept.  So I went on line to read some more about it.  In the Huffington Post I found the following article: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/samir-ibrahim/white-roofs-green-myth_b_2901288.html.  The concept might work in warmer climates, but not in colder climates, according to the article.  The author (Samir Ibrahim) gives all kinds of interesting reasons for this; but then he is in the roofing business, which makes you wonder if he has any interest in shattering the white roof concept.  Oh well, maybe another myth shattered.  I guess we need to go back to reducing emissions, and greening this world.  But now I recently heard a small presentation on the BBC on how older trees are more efficient in fixing carbon versus younger trees (sorry no reference here).  Oh well.

 

Richmond (1/15/2014)

Decided I needed to make up for a rainy day yesterday and had a 45 minute walk by the James River and back through town. This is a picture of the canal http://www.envisionthejames.org/detail/james-river-and-kanawha-canal/evj6E320620CD3A8CF84that runs along the James downtown. It has a nice walking path along it and there were quite a few walkers out today. A nice stiff walk and revenge for being stuck inside yesterday.