December 2024

Digital painting of a dusk sky, half-covered with black clouds. Low on the horizon, dark orange clouds stand tall, next to one another. There are city lights sprinkled beneath them. Above the clouds, the sky is orange and grey.

December 2nd

We report sometime around dusk, or perhaps a bit later - it is hard to tell here, where the sky is often orange the whole night through. The stars are grounded tonight. It smells like smoke. We walk alongside the titans on the horizon and watch them lay down, one after the other.

Digital painting of a field of tall grass under a heavy sky. The clouds are dark grey, pooling low over the horizon, with wisps of rain dropping down underneath. They leave an opening to a lighter sky over the grass.

December 1st

We report: December, born out of rain in the night. We barely need to breathe out for steam to fog up our face, humid as it is out here. The sky says nothing but more rain, and it is nice, to have that certitude for a while longer. We listen close for the quiet between raindrops.

Digital painting of a voluminous, white cloud rising into a bright blue sky, surrounded by smaller, wispy white clouds.

December 4th

We report with our nose so cold that we have managed to convince ourselves it could fall off any minute. We understand the reason why it gets colder on clear days - no cloud cover to keep the cold air out and the warm air in. Still, it feels a little counterintuitive to us.

Digital painting of a sunset sky, pale orange with a few pink clouds, the biggest of them a dark red, torn up edges floating away.

December 3rd

We report: we spend so much time trying to be at the right moment, at the right place, that we sometimes forget about good things happening by chance. The sunset snuck up on us, and it almost upset us, that it looked so nice, that we had not anticipated it. We felt happy.

Digital painting of a choppy sea, dark grey and green, on a foggy day. The sky is low, a uniform pale grey that muddles the horizon line.

December 5th

We report: here we are, breathing in more brine than air, and perhaps our lungs will rust. The damp has gotten to every part of us already, and our mind is foggy, and our hands are salt-sticky. We will probably be something new once we get back, a creature from the deep.

Digital painting of a sunset sky, a large grey cloud with the sun burning its edges orange and yellow. There are a few other orange clouds floating across the pastel green sky.

December 7th

We report: the days are shorter and shorter, the clouds are speeding across the sky, and we keep finding dead leaves in our hair when we come home. Autumn is giving way to winter with each drop of the thermometer, and each gust of wind in our ears. The sky is burning out.

Digital painting of a cloudy, dark blue sky, with purple tones. There are a few streaks of pink going across the frame.

December 6th

We report in some kind of limbo: the sky has had this little bit of pink for a little while now, but it remains quite dark. It seems that the sun will not budge. It is a chilly, windy dawn; we are flexing our fingers to keep them from going numb. It starts raining.

Digital painting of a sunset sky, horizontal layers of clouds; pale blue, pastel pink, bright red, yellow, and dark purple mingling with one another.

December 11th

We report, our eyes fixed on the afterimage of the sun: the fine hail of this afternoon has stayed frozen on the ground. In half light, the white of it has taken on the pink of the sky. When we close the window, our face feels numb from the cold, and we take the icy air with us.

Digital painting of a blue sky with a few long, wispy, white clouds occupying the top half of the frame. One of the clouds has undulations creating a striation through its whole length.

December 8th

We report: there are ripples in the sky today, like well-worn grooves in the sand at low tide. Our expert tells us that some people research these things, and we certainly understand why looking at them. The wind sorts through the sediments some more as we are sitting here.

Digital painting of a cloudy sky filled with all shades of grey, almost white to almost black, messily arranged into a rainy landscape.

December 9th

We report under remarkably weighty skies, in the early evening. It has been raining on and off through this whole day, and yet the clouds that have shown up from behind us announce substantial precipitation to come. We hear the presage of a hail shower in the distance.

Digital painting of a pale blue sky, filled with all manners of grey clouds, with a thin rainbow splitting the frame in half. The sky is lighter inside of the arc, and darker outside of it.

December 21st

We report on the day of the winter solstice: the whole event almost passed us by, which is a common issue on the shortest day of the year. It was a good thing, then, that we were able to witness a brief, faint rainbow. A little something to remember this solstice by.

Digital painting of a starry, dark blue night sky, half-covered with fuzzy, pinkish clouds at the bottom of the frame.

December 10th

We report: a truce with the rain, tonight, and from what we can tell, the clouds are more sparse than they have been in quite a few nights. Nonetheless, the persistent wind has not stopped blowing for the past week, and it happily pulls tears and snot from our ruddy face.

Digital painting of a blue sky featuring wispy white clouds, curvy, swirly, semi-translucent wispy white clouds.

December 12th

We report: the clouds are spreading like smoke today, curling in and around one another. There is a lightness to it all. The wind has fallen back down to less staggering speeds, so we have an easier time listening to our expert as they talk about cirrus intortus.

Digital painting of a foggy landscape, orange and brown tall grass in the foreground, with trees fading into the distant haze.

December 13th

We report in the late morning: we thought the fog would be all gone by now, but it has barely lifted at all. It seems that we have traded the wind for more humidity - certainly a big change. Frost clings to the grass in some spots, making for a fascinatingly crunchy walk.

Digital painting of a grey dusk sky with a full, yellow moon rising. There are dark silhouettes of bare trees in the fore and background, contrasting with the sky.

December 14th

We report: the trees are already bare here, and the moon is too big in the sky - always is, while it is rising. It would seem that autumn was a short affair here. It is that much easier to see the evening birds without the leaves, and we track their silhouettes in the dusk sky.

Digital painting of a sunset sky, a pastel blue, filled with many puffy, bright pink and orange clouds, purple in their shadows.

December 15th

We report on this mid-December day: it has been an oddly quiet day. The last few weeks have been punctuated with storms and cold spells; many roofs lost their tiles, and our usual path is currently a mud slide. Today, there was a light drizzle, and nothing much else. Quiet.

Digital painting of a blue sky filled with fuzzy white clouds, and smaller, jagged ones. One of the smallest ones bears a wave pattern on top of it.

December 16th

We report: just a minute ago, the sky was a perfect blue, but now that we look again, all sorts of intruders have appeared. A little bit further west, the cloud cover is impressively dense. In the east, the horizon is still completely clear. We are giving it two minutes more.

Digital painting of a cloudy sky, light grey, with layers of a darker grey framing it at the top and the bottom. There is a yellow-orange hue coming through, and tiny freckles of clouds in the bottom half. The general impression is mellow, quiet.

December 17th

We report about these dusk-tinged days around the solstice. They are brittle little things, the wobbly light threatening to go out upon the smallest disturbance. We go about our afternoon with careful steps, lest the whole thing blinks out. The soft clouds stretch forevermore.

Digital painting of a light blue dusk sky, full of dark blue clouds; some are long and thin, others are rounder, smaller, and darker.

December 18th

We report: the night is pulling away, and the rain is going as well. For unknown reasons, the street lamps on our block have not been working lately; the nights have been dark places out of this world. When the morning comes, we get brought back to reality. We fall back asleep.

Digital painting of a sunrise sky above a snowy field. There is a bright orange brushstroke above the horizon, with a pale yellow-blue expanse above that. A couple of birds flying. Some trees in the distance, and track marks in the snow.

December 19th

We report: we saw a field mouse run across the path earlier, and it was all we could do not to take it home to give it a scarf and a hat. We are aware that we are projecting, what with the fact that we only have one glove for some reason. We are jumping in place to warm up.

Digital painting of a tall white cloud in a bright blue sky, with smaller, grey, wispy clouds sprinkled around it. There is a seagull flying in the middle of the frame. The light is slightly golden.

December 20th

We report: the seagulls are a loud crowd out here this morning, just like every other morning, to be frank. The cold on the seaside is quite a different affair. The wind is a constant, of course, but the briny air cuts deeper. It is lucky that we found our lost glove.

Digital painting of the seaside at nightfall. It is all shades of blue, the overcast sky, and the sea with its frothy waves. On the horizon, the coast and a few islands are visible. There are yellow and white lights dotting them.

December 22nd

We report: as the night was falling upon us, our expert confidently told us that they had already noticed that the day had gotten longer. While our expert is one of the best there ever was, we feel it is healthy to exercise our critical thinking, so we called them out on the lie.

Digital painting of a sunset sky, faded blues and yellows with bright orange and yellow shreds of clouds floating there.

December 23rd

We report: we took the road that heads westwards just so we could see the sunset better. It is going to be quite the detour, at least until dark, when the way will be harder to find. The clouds wander at the slowest pace, though we can see the trees sway wildly on the ground.

Digital painting of a wide blue sky, with some wisps of white clouds at the bottom of the frame, mostly long and thin.

December 24th

We report this December morning: our expert has been teaching us to be attentive to the weather for years now, and we do our best. We tried to predict today's weather two days ago; freezing rain, wind, perhaps a brief sunny spell. Today, we have requested our expert keep quiet.

Digital painting of a cloudy sky, with diffuse sunlight coming from everywhere, scattering yellow all over. There is a patch of rain between two clouds, and a bird flying high.

December 25th

We report: the sun is filtering through the rain, revealing brassy tones in the air, suspended crystals glinting off in the light. We breathe in, and in, and in, because there is a smell just out of reach that reminds us of something. It slips off before we can catch it.

Digital painting of a night sky, inky black in the top half, with many blurry stars dotting the dark. The bottom half is full of grey fog that mostly extinguishes the light of the stars.

December 26th

We report: it is very, very early in the morning, and we have all but forgotten why we are even awake. It has to be the coldest night ever recorded, whatever our expert says. The culprit is, as it often is, the humidity. The stars bravely pierce through the fog.

Digital painting of a sunset sky, deep purple clouds with a bright pink bottom edge. It feathers out there, meeting a light peach bit of clear sky.

December 27th

We report in the shadows of this worn day: the sun is a drop of lemon juice in mallow tea, pink acidity bleeding into tired purple. We are crumbling down to the last days of the year, and we keep expecting that there will be no more, that we will shut it all down early.

Digital painting of a seaside landscape, blue sea with white waves and brown rocks emerging, and the light blue sky above, filled with fluffy, white and grey clouds. The light is soft and diffuse.

December 28th

We report: it is winter in earnest now, and we are getting used to our nose and our toes always being a little bit cold again. We came here back in the summer, and it is a wonder that we can barely remember how the sun felt then, true, high, and bright in the sky.

Digital painting of an overcast sky, with a huge, voluminous cloud rising up, with silver accents where the light is hitting it. The shadows are blue, and the sky behind is a lighter grey.

December 29th

We report: we look at any cloud that looks particularly tall with suspicions of snow lately. It is not a very realistic expectation, and it constantly sets us up for disappointment, but we cannot help ourself. We can tell our expert is letting us believe on purpose.

Digital painting of a dusk sky, black clouds in a gradient of dark blue going to a faded ochre tint. The clouds are similar shapes, long, with jagged edges, but various sizes. There is a star where the colour of the sky is meeting darkness.

December 30th

We report ocean colours in the dusk sky, restless bits and all. Wedged between two clouds, Vega is slowly sinking into heavier waters, along with the rest of its invisible constellation; dragged into the deep by an endless stream. We feel taken by the same eddy.

Digital painting of a cloudy dusk sky, voluminous clouds in gold, dusty blue and copper tones, all boiling upwards in dramatic lighting.

December 31st

We report: this year, we had endeavoured to keep count of all of our blinks. We lost count within roughly seven minutes after the clock struck midnight. For the next year, we have decided to abstain from such resolutions, although we do hope to see a few more sunrises.

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