Figure 1 – Tampa Bay Sunrise. December 14, 2013,. (c) DE Wolf 2013.

As a New Englander I always find it strange to travel to some warm place in winter.  Provided that you stay in the Northern hemisphere there seems to be something peculiar going on.  It’s a lot warmer, but just as dark.  The sun still hangs relatively low in the sky and there is still a foreboding sense of winter.

This week I found myself… Wait that’s a silly way to put it, I got on an airplane and arrived in Tampa.  While my wife dealt with the first big snow of winter 2013/14, I was in sunshine.  This btw did not make me popular with my wife.  Also the city of Tampa found it necessary to spray some kind of artificial snow all over the place.  Whatever it was didn’t fool me and burned my eyes.

Still these are the shortest days of the year – even in Florida.  I offer up Figure 1 we shows the winter sun trying to rise over Tampa Bay shrouded in clouds.  This was a tough picture to work up and, I think, not totally successful.  Still Ibelieve that it conveys the feeling of the morning.  The sun cracks both the horizon and the clouds.  Look closely an you will see a blow-up Santa leaning over the balcony on the building in the foreground.