Free Sunrise Research – Celebrating mistYmuse First Week

After a bright start to the neo-pagan mistYmuse (Most Ideal Sunrise Times – Midwinter Until Spring Equinox) winter festival it’s been a wet greenYgrey week in the UK, with limited opportunities for terrific twilight photos taken by only the most tenacious. However, after low pressure has dominated,  high pressure is forecast for tomorrow and the next few days, providing lots of opportunities for tremendous twilight times viewing.

Apologies to readers from outside the UK if this blog post is UKcentric, but there is some mistYmuse information that is relevant to everybody, about how location affects the sunrise times. The research I reveal for free below is not as clear doing it internationally, because of time differences.

Sunrise Variations 

The ‘Most Ideal Sunrise Times’ of mistYmuse was inspired by Leeds times, with the midwinter sunrise of about 08.30 ideal for the traditional starting time of 9am for many workplaces and institutions.

However, even in the UK those times can vary depending on location, as our planet Earth is spinning around anti-clockwise on an axis, and the farther south and east you are in the northern hemisphere means you see the sun the earliest in winter – known to us as ‘sunrise’.

New Sunrise Research

Using the timeanddate website, Inverness in the north of Scotland is already in that ‘ideal time’, with sunrise today at 08.26.

Farther south, Edinburgh was at 08.13. At about the same latitude, but farther west, Glasgow was at 08.17.

Belfast is farther south again, but also farther west, so is also at 08.17; its more southerly location would have made the sunrise earlier than Glasgow, but because it’s more west as well, that cancelled out the southerly gains.

Farther south and east, Cardiff was at 07.51; and continuing east at about the same latitude, London was at 07.38.

Leeds, mistYmuse heartland, farther north and a little more west than London, in the middle of the UK, was at 07.55 today.

Returning to time, rather than location, Leeds’s sunrise is twelve minutes later than seven days ago (07.43), the first day of mistYmuse 2019/20 (#mYm2019).

While the above is focused on the UK it’s the same around the world, and you can search world cities on the timeanddate website; I have no interest or contact with that website, and have just used it as you can.

I have written some great books though!

Poem Inspired by mistYmuse on Day 4 of Longest Festival

Where there is mist

Y, there is muse

Tryst In Me, Sky Birds Tree

grist to the mill
mist on the hill
words enter mind
meet-up maybe rhymed

then they chime, clickety click time

sub-lime olive green
branch bells ringing
nest like ancient amygdala
mirroring brain stripped bare

I wasn’t going to write a poem until seeing the misty weather forecast; even though I could see the mist! so the above poem could definitely be said to have been inspired by the mistYmuse, although it was more about seeing it in writing and having the proof to display.

A couple of links I used:

grist to the mil definition 
brain and trees similarities

A couple of books I wrote and recommend:

Winter Months Fireside Wordplay Poem

The dark cold hinterland between the Northern Hemisphere’s late autumn/fall and winter is here. A perfect time for fireside retrospection and wordplay.
On the second day of #mYm2019 here is the first poem to wordplay the embers of months with those of fires, as far as I know.

mistYmuse Reflection, Fireside Connection

Nov-ember, Dec-ember
dying embers of year?
preceded by Sept-ember.

like night’s end, sitting around fire

spent remembering past
of life and ancestors?
Imagination, Creation

Longest Winter Festival Ever? mistYmuse 2019 is here

It’s November 21st again, and that can mean only one thing: mistYmuse (Most Ideal Sunrise Times – Midwinter Until Spring Equinox) is here once again, and planned to see you through the northern hemisphere’s traditionally toughest weather four months; especially for SAD (Seasonal Affective Disorder) sufferers.
I’ve seen loads of great twilight times photos on the news this week, which has thankfully been quite clear and dry. Here’s one I prepared before, from a magical day on the Hafnarfjord in Iceland in the inaugural mistYmuse of 2017/18; perhaps when the idea really took shape, after seeing how Iceland extend their winter celebrations into February:

Longest Festival in the World?

Great news, and there’s even better, because #mYm2019 is set to be bigger than ever; okay, last year’s was the first full one, after creating the idea half way through the previous winter!
Let’s get the party started with a concert song from a decade ago I recently saw, starring Scooter with a great gYgPOP (greenYgrey PinkyOrangePurple) stage show. There’s no sound on that, so I’ve also included the song with sound.

The concert footage is from the same year as my original winter sunrises video, which is basically what mistYmuse is most about:

In a way, it’s quite apt the Scooter concert footage doesn’t have sound, as neither do sunrises!

Winter Solstice Month Away Means mistYmuse Week Day

The way I see sunrays sweetly sing, and songbirds softly shine, I think it must be… mistYmuse week…

Through Trees Horizon, Inspirational Words Arising

winter sun
gentle one
subtle fun
no sunburn
year’s done
timeless pun
mistYmuse return, yet again
without pain
no disdain
still unsane*
freedom’s fane*
perhaps inane*
Y-tying m-twain*

*unsane – intentional non-word, describing state neither sane or insane.
*fane –  temple. Found while looking for ‘feign’ originally!
* inane – recognition that this is ‘just’ art.
*mistYmuse – Y joining two m-words.

Bottom half changed course from:
words play
four day
Morgana Fey
greenYgrey say

 

The Cult and Piston Tour Joins Prestigious Rock n’ Roll Hall of Fame

With Halloween and Bonfire Night finished and a month and a half of dodgy weather doldrums in the northern hemisphere until Christmas I’m sure you’re all delighted mistYmuse 2019 (#mYm2019) starts in a fortnight (not fortnite!).

To begin the countdown (not to the full moon, like in the old greenYgrey days!) here’s another essential on the greenYgrey calendar!

The Cult Sonic Temple Tour

The Cult’s show at the Leeds o2 Academy celebrating their classic Sonic Temple album’s 30th anniversary was chosen as this year’s gYg of the Year, supported by Piston.
So they have been added to the prestigious gYg rock n’ roll hall of fame, now in its second decade:

• 2009: Lynyrd Skynyrd
• 2010: Guns N’ Roses and Skid Row
• 2011: Motley Crue, Def Leppard and Steel Panther
• 2012: W.A.S.P.
• 2013: Alice in Chains, Ghost and Walking Papers
• 2014: The Pretty Reckless, Heaven’s Basement and Nothing More
• 2015: Motley Crue, Alice Cooper and The One Hundred
• 2016: Black Sabbath, Rammstein, Saxon, Iron Maiden, Megadeth, The Wildhearts, Halestorm, The Temperance Movement, Kadavar, the Gutterdammerung band and movie, The Electric Wizard, Rival Sons, Sixx A.M., The Amorettes, The Men That Will Be Blamed For Nothing, Avatar, Monster Truck, Whiskey Myers, Grand Magus, Scorpion Child, Inglorious, Royal Republic, Santa Cruz, Deftones, Strange Bones, Graveyard, Tremonti and Gojira.
• 2017: Guns N’ Roses, The Kills and Tyler Bryant and the Shakedown
• 2018: Rose Tattoo and Girlschool
•  2019: The Cult and Piston

Sonic Temple: Sun King and Wild Flower

Here’s a video I took of their opening two numbers. Sun King was my favourite track from Sonic Temple, but there are many great songs in that album and others.
I of course married the Sun last year, but don’t consider myself a king; more a consort!
The Cult were my favourite British band of the late ’80s, after Rainbow and Saxon in the early ’80s.
While Guns N’ Roses were my favourite band, I thought The Cult’s Electric and Sonic Temple would have been worthy successors to Guns’ Appetite for Destruction; and that was probably why Guns poached drummer Matt Sorum from The Cult when Adler had problems during Guns’ follow-up Illusion sessions.

If you liked any of the above, you may like my books, full of ’80s/’90s rock band references. I’ve joined the Woodland Trust to offset paper.