Same time next year

A quick twitter exchange from last week is the inspiration for today.

So I'm totally not trying to start an internet flame war, but "it depends what you're measuring" is a good question to ask.

Since 1997 the only years that didn't have at least one day in April that reached 20°C were 2002, 2007 and 2011. And in 15 of the 20 years we managed to string together at least a couple of warm days above the 18°C range. That was even happening way back in 1916.

So yes, the average high for mid-April is only 12°C. But it's also completely normal to have a few days above 20°C. Not having a 20°C day would be weird.

Average ≠ Normal

Edmontonians treat warm weather in "winter" like it's a freak occurrence. In almost every January there will be a week above 0°C, and in almost every April there will be days above 20°C - just last year we had comparable temperatures during this exact same week in April. And yet every year we pretend that it's never, ever happened before, and insist that it will never, ever happen again.

Now all that being said, the forecast is calling for a few more really warm days this week, and maybe even a record or two. Once the actual numbers are in the books I'll be back with a recap (and I'll try to take some of the fun out of temperature records). Update: one record, and one not-record