This is an archived article that was published on sltrib.com in 2016, and information in the article may be outdated. It is provided only for personal research purposes and may not be reprinted.
There were two forecasts for Utah, yea, and, lo, the world on Wednesday. Polygamous "prophet" and convicted child rapist Warren Jeffs seemingly was wrong — the National Weather Service was right.
The Apocalypse did not arrive as April 6 dawned, as followers of Jeffs reportedly feared; there were no earthquakes to free Jeffs from his Texas prison cell. (Although, if you suffer allergies, some part of your consciousness — silently wailing behind those throbbing, swollen sinuses — may wish for the End of Blooming, if not the End of Days. More on that later.)
It came to pass that it was science, not dire portents, which ran true. Meteorologists prognosticated temperatures in the mid-60s under clear, sunny skies along the Wasatch Front. And, verily, on Thursday the forecast was even more divine, the golden rays of a smiling Sol warming the Salt Lake and Tooele valleys into the mid-70s.
Southern Utahns — including Jeff's polygamous enclave on the Utah-Arizona border — was blessed with clear, sunny skies and highs in the upper-70s to low-80s. On Thursday, Utah's Dixie will be just as warm, and the arrival of some clouds hopefully will spark more creative, positive visions of "Rows and flows of angel hair, and ice cream castles in the air . . . feather canyons everywhere."
This caveat from Joni Mitchell: like love and life, you never can know clouds, at all.
And, in those clouds? Pollen. The Intermountain Allergy & Asthma website reported that those blooming cedar and cottonwood trees were spewing misery at "very high" levels as of Wednesday, while "high" levels of allergens wafted from oaks and willows. Birch, ash, and mold were at "moderate" counts.
The Utah Division of Air Quality graded particulate pollution levels as low, giving all air monitoring districts in the state its "green" grade.
For more extensive forecast information, visit The Salt Lake Tribune's weather page at: http//www.sltrib.com/weather/.
Twitter: @remims