Winter in Tucson, Part One

Aside from the car with the "Luv U" plate, this was what I saw when I left for work this morning, the view that caused me to go back to the house for the Mavica camera. The snow-topped Catalina Mountains were much more spectacular as seen overlooking patches of desert in vacant lots near 22nd and Swan. However,  I'm not quite foolish enough to take pictures while driving at 40 miles per hour along busy, wet streets. So let's just start with what we have, as Count Rugen might say.

In Tucson, snow is most often seen from afar, atop the Catalinas, Rincons and sometimes the Tucson Mountains, which aren't as tall. Snow on the ground within the city itself only happens about once every couple of years. The rest of the time, including last night, Summerhaven's snow is Tucson's badly-needed rain. We are still in a drought here, and it is a desert, after all.

It's been raining pretty much every day (or night, or both) since the end of last week. The rain has brought with it high temperatures in the 40s and 50s, what I like to think of as real "Syracuse weather." It's not windy, though, or bitingly cold. Still, with nighttime temperatures around freezing, it's about as close as Tucson gets to winter.

I bought a new jacket on Sunday, for more money than John would want me to spend under our present circumstances. I chose a red and black one, in honor of the red and black wardrobe of leather and plastic and Spandex clothes I wore for a while when I was much younger and thinner.  I still love those colors.

My new jacket has a zip-out lining that I haven't used yet, in case it gets really cold some night, or I go up the mountain or leave town. Without the lining, though, my purchase has already come in handy. It replaces a ratty, black and off-white fleecy thing that my mom bought me from a Lane Bryant or Haband catalog years ago. The zipper came off that last week, but I may keep it to wear at my computer on winter days in my unheated office at home.

I have better pictures of Tucson winters past, but I'll show you those another time.

Karen

Update: I took a few more pictures at lunch. There was visibly less snow (it's 59 degrees in the city right now), but here's a picture anyway. The building (across the street from Golden Corral) was low income housing for a while, but I think it's become a hotel again.