My OBT

What if you spent every day looking for One Beautiful Thing?

Look Up!

by 19 Comments

The Cloud Appreciation Society

Since 2014, I’ve been spending my days looking around for beautiful things, but today’s folks find their joy in the skies above. This is the wonderful group known as The Cloud Appreciation Society. The Society’s manifesto (because of course they have one) says their mission is to fight ‘blue-sky thinking’ wherever they find it. That’s pretty adorable. This marvelous group of people are working to combat clouds’ bad reputation. They instead think of clouds as nature’s poetry.

All this talk about clouds made me think of one of my favorite Joni Mitchell songs.

Both Sides, Now by Joni Mitchell

Rows and flows of angel hair
And ice cream castles in the air
And feather canyons everywhere
I looked at clouds that way.
But now they only block the sun.
They rain and snow on everyone.
So many things I would have done
But clouds got in my way.
I’ve looked at clouds from both sides now
From up and down and still somehow
It’s cloud’s illusions I recall.
I really don’t know clouds at all.

The Cloud Appreciation Society was founded in 2005 by Gavin Pretor-Pinney, member number 00,001, and it’s currently got more than 50,000 members spread out over 120 countries. Membership in the society includes a subscription to the Society’s Cloud-a-Day email. In addition to the Society’s online community and in-person gatherings, members are also encouraged to upload photographs to the Cloudspotter app to earn stars and badges for accurate cloud identifications.

The Cloud Appreciation Society has a presence on the internet and on Instagram and Facebook, but if you really want to be part of the club, just remember to look up and appreciate!

View this post on Instagram

In this expanse of Stratocumulus clouds over the Pacific Ocean spotted by astronaut Karen Nyberg from the International Space Station, there are strange regions of holes that seem to radiate in star-like patterns. These formations are known as ‘actinoform’ clouds, whose name derives from the Greek for a ‘ray’. They were first noticed in the 1960s with the dawn of the satellite age. This is because the radial patterns are at such a huge scale – often around 300 km / 200 miles across – that they only become apparent when viewed from Space. The enormous, swirling cloud stars can form wherever marine Stratocumulus develop, such as off the west coasts of Africa, Australia, Peru and Southern California in the US. Why actinoform clouds develop, how they form and what effects they may have on the weather and climate are mysteries waiting patiently to be solved. . #cloudappreciationsociety #cloudappreciation #cloudspotting #cloudaday #clouds #cloud #stratocumulus

A post shared by The Cloud Appreciation Society (@cloudappsoc) on

View this post on Instagram

This Cumulonimbus, spotted on a flight from the south of France to Paris by Ana de la Ferrière (Member 46,812), is showing a peak of cloud extending above the cloud’s flat anvil, or incus. This upper Cumulonimbus extension is known as an overshooting top. It is where the central rising core of the cloud is pushing up through the tropopause, the boundary between the troposphere and the stratosphere that acts as an invisible ceiling to the growth of clouds and is the reason a tall storm cloud spreads out horizontally at the top to form the incus. An overshooting top like this indicates that the storm is producing a particularly strong updraft. If the overshoot persists for longer than ten minutes it suggests that severe weather is raging below, possibly even a supercell storm. More often, the overshoot soon subsides – lost as it spreads and merges into the ice-crystal canopy of the incus. . #cloudappreciation #cloudspotting #cloudaday #clouds #cloud #cumulonimbus

A post shared by The Cloud Appreciation Society (@cloudappsoc) on

View this post on Instagram

When the speed or direction of wind changes over a relatively short distance in the atmosphere it is known as wind shear. A particular type of wind shear is responsible for creating fluctus clouds – one of the rarest and most photogenic varieties. The vortices of air that twist the tops of clouds into these wave-like formations are produced when a layer of warmer air is moving faster than a layer of colder air below it. The difference in speed forms undulations in the air between the layers and if the wind shear is strong enough these will curl upwards into 'breakers'. This mechanism was studied by nineteenth-century scientists Lord Kelvin and Hermann von Helmholtz, after whom this cloud is also named. . Fluctus, or Kelvin-Helmholtz wave clouds creating a stir over New York, US spotted by Ginny Stuart (Member 28,617). . #cloudappreciation #cloudspotting #cloudaday #clouds #cloud #fluctus

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Author: Donna from MyOBT

I have committed to spending part of every day looking for at least one beautiful thing, and sharing what I find with you lovelies!

19 thoughts on “Look Up!”

Leave a comment

  2. bcparkison
    February 22, 2020 at 8:54 am

    We have always enjoyed watching the weather ( clouds). sometimes I see what others see and sometimes not but things do look different above the clouds than below.

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply
  3. janhaltn
    February 22, 2020 at 9:56 am

    I have been watching clouds since a young childhood laying on the ground in the backyard. There are times there are really some beautiful ones. Hal

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply
  4. Alison and Don
    February 22, 2020 at 10:03 am

    Wonderful cloud shots (and I’m definitely a fan of clouds) but oh oh oh – Joni Mitchel Both Sides Now – I just have to share this with you:

    It might be geoblocked. If it is let me know and I’ll find a copy that won’t be. It’s current Canadian Ice Dance champions skating to Both Sides Now
    Alison

    Liked by 2 people

    Reply
  5. janhaltn
    February 22, 2020 at 11:12 am

    I am not sure how we got beautiful skating involved with clouds but I will take skating anywhere I can find it. It wasn’t ‘geoblocked’ in Citra FL. Thanks for the post. Hal

    Liked by 2 people

    Reply

  7. Pingback: Creative Juice #179 | ARHtistic License

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