This Isn't Exactly Turning Out To Be The Sunniest September

Skies cleared suddenly over Richmond, Vermont Wednesday
after a temperature inversion suddenly lifted. It was almost 
completely overcast ten minutes before this photo was
taken. More clouds began arriving a couple hours later
as the next system kept our rather cloudy 
September going. 

 Septembers in Vermont often bring us long strings of sunny, mellow pleasant days.

This hasn't been one of those Septembers, as you probably guessed. 

We've certainly had nice, bright days this month, but we've also endured strings of cloudy, sometimes downright gloomy days. 

It's just the luck of the draw, I guess. We've been victimized by stalled or nearly stalled weather fronts at least three times this month.  Frequent storm systems have also been able to take advantage of plenty of moisture working its way up toward us from the Gulf of Mexico. 

I guess you can find the beauty in rain, overcast and fog. The spookiness and darkness of it all is pretty interesting, in my view. I put a video up, which you can see at the bottom of the post, that sort of embraced the rain, fog and dreariness we dealt with this past Sunday and Monday. 

Today dawned with another round of rain and scattered downpours. Though we'll see glimpses of sun today, a cold front will also bring scattered showers and plunging temperatures this afternoon.  

Some sun will break through Friday, but we'll have quite a chill in the air. We'll actually have a rather sunny, though not completely clear weekend before another long stretch of cloudiness takes over.

I don't really have statistics on how this September ranks in terms of cloudiness compared to other Septembers.  How do you define a cloudy day, anyway? Does it have to feature a solid overcast, or could you get an hour or two with a few small breaks in the clouds? Is a high, thin overcast in which the sun can filter through a little bit truly a cloudy day? 

Yeah, it's subjective. 

To me, I'd register this year as a cloudier than average September. Which is contrary to earlier long range forecasts for the month which predicted warmer and drier than average weather. 

Early next week, another trough of low pressure will linger nearby, creating another three days in a row or so of cloudy, showery weather. 

The cloudiness we've seen this month is a prelude to what normally happens in late autumn in Vermont By November, we can expect near constant gloom.  Sorry I'm not cheering you up there.

Part of the problem with late autumn is you get inversions, which is a layer of warm air atop cooler air. This will often leave us sulking under a low overcast. The tops of the mountains poke up above these clouds into sunshine, but the rest of us are stuck under the gloom.

This actually happened during the first half of Wednesday. An inversion kept low clouds, fog and drizzle going through midday. Again, another prelude to late fall. The low overcast persisted in Vermont until increasing south winds abruptly scoured all this out. 

Of course, the south winds were announcing the arrival of the new weather system that came through last night and this morning. The sunshine in Vermont was short lived as clouds swept in during the late afternoon and evening. 

It's the story of this September, I guess. 

Video. If you don't see an image below click on this link to view. Otherwise, click on the image below to watch.