Sunshine and a warm breeze this early Thursday on California’s north coast, as we pass through a short-mini heat wave.

Right here along the shoreline we nearly reached 80-degrees (79) on Wednesday as a warming streak smacked the region/state real hard — Crescent City hit a record, too, as did much of Humboldt County (via Lost Coast Outpost yesterday evening): ‘Chances are you’re a bit sweatier today than you were a year ago. A representative with the local National Weather Service office tells the Outpost that today was Eureka’s hottest April 6th on record. Today’s high of 76 degrees, breaks the previous record of 70 degrees set in 2009.’
Just a one-shot deal, though.

Later today/tomorrow, back to ‘normal…’

(Illustration found here).

And in the nowadays, ‘normal‘ changes near-daily.
Cool returns to the North Coast starting today, as an El Niño-influenced system roils across us the next week or so, with cloud cover, maybe some rain, and not-so-hot temperatures. (‘Hot‘ being relative).

Weather yesterday for my little area was as ‘good-as-it-gets‘ — slightly-cool breeze with warm temperatures, near-perfect in the shade. And late into the day, too, didn’t start to chill until almost-near dark.

We’re doing okay, others not so. This interesting bit of weather prose from LA’s CityLab this morning:

Yesterday’s lowest temperatures in the U.S. measured -10 degrees in Estcourt Station, Maine, and -4 degrees on the rime-encrusted (but beautiful!) ice-hell of Mount Washington, New Hampshire.
Meanwhile, a compressed heat wave pushed the mercury to 101 degrees in the aptly named community of Thermal, California.
In more populated areas the temperature gulch was also extreme — for instance, 99 degrees in Boulder Creek, California, versus record-breaking lows like 11 degrees in Concord, New Hampshire, and 13 degrees in Bangor, Maine.
For Wednesday’s shriveling heat—seriously, Oakland’s 91-degree high obliterated the old record of 86 in 1989—Californians can thank a “warm air mass and offshore flow,” according to CBS SF.
Meanwhile, Northeasterners trying to work feeling back into their fingertips should blame a “lobe” of the polar vortex that escaped into the Lower 48 this weekend, writes Weather Underground’s Steve Gregory.
Arctic cold is expected to roar back in the coming days, with yet-more April snow possible on Saturday in the Northeast down to Washington, D.C.

Odd, oblonging weather continually — despite the fluctuations, (the ‘walking the dog’ explanation), the trend has become obvious. From Climate Central yesterday, on a report from the NOAA:

The toasty conditions in the U.S. mirror those of the planet as a whole, which experienced its record warmest year-to-date by far through February.
While a strong El Niño has given global temperatures a boost, the bulk of that heat comes from the manmade global warming driven by increasing amounts of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases in the atmosphere.
Global temperature data for March won’t be released until next week, but it is likely the warm streak will continue.
In the U.S., while no state or region had a record warm March, all areas were above average and the month was the fourth warmest March for the entire Lower 48.
At 6°F (3.3°C) above the 20th century average of 41.5°F (5.3°C), it was the warmest March since 2012.
The balmy March conditions followed record warm winter and autumn seasons for the contiguous U.S.
“The warmth during March was a continuation of what we saw during the winter months,” NOAA climatologist Jake Crouch said in an email.
Such balmy winter weather isn’t unexpected during a strong El Niño, but winters are warming overall in the U.S. thanks to climate change.
For the year to date, the Lower 48’s average temperature is in third place, measuring 4.6°F (2.5°C) above the 20th century average of 35.1°F (1.7°C).

And the beat-heat goes on…