Beware of Dogs

Beware of SUNDOGS, that is. I had never heard of, let alone witnessed a sundog until Thursday morning when someone pointed out a huge, rainbow colored ring around the sun. It was a beautiful, sunny morning and the ring around the sun was quite a phenomenon for an hour or so until the sun rose higher on the horizon. Sundogs, scientifically named parhelia meaning "beside the sun", occur most often at sunrise or sunset when the sun is low. They form when sunlight is refracted through ice crystals in cirrus clouds and often indicate that a drastic change in weather is on the way. Our drastic change has come as extremely windy conditions for the last 4 days [and running] with gusts of 25 - 30 mph. Today we have a wind advisory [gusts of 31 - 39mph] on land and a gale warning [39-54mph] on the water as well as small craft advisories. I just heard on the radio that a cruise ship has canceled docking today in Key West because it's too rough for them to come in. Whereas this would be just a windy day on land, it's quite blustery here on the boat. We've had to secure everything that could possibly blow away or bang around. I have the kayak lifted out of the water and secured to the side of the boat...although, I apparently did not have it secured well enough to start with as I noticed on one of trips outside that the kayak was actually flying along side the boat during an especially big gust. Getting off the boat is a little challenging with the water in the harbor being quite choppy. It's a wet and bumpy dinghy ride into the docks. Staying on the boat provides it's own challenges...all my tuperware lids have blown off the dish drying towel and my McDonald's coffee cup just won't stay put... and a little fancy footwork is required when the boat shifts. We've had a little rain, more mist than anything, and it's still a balmy 80 degrees. Hurricane Ida [recently downgraded to a tropical storm] has blown past us with little to no effect and things should be settling down later this afternoon.

Note: The picture shown is not mine, and not of the actual sundog that occurred on Thursday. It is extremely similar to what I saw and provides a visual on what a sundog looks like.