The past few days around town have been quite dreary. You know, times when it’s either raining outside or it looks like at any given moment it’s about to start raining (again). Last night there was a considerable soaking of rain that fell for much of the later evening until I went to sleep.

Heavy and dreary cloud cover hovers over downtown Roanoke, as viewed from Salem Avenue (5/6/09).

So, sunshine has been scarce and clouds plentiful lately.

But, there is more than one way to look at the…we’ll call it less than preferable weather. On the one hand, the weather seems quite depressing.

But, on the other hand, it appears that most of the area foliage is quite happy. As a result most area lawns are a deep shade of healthy green. Trees along Mill Mountain are getting thicker with fresh, new leaves of the season.

Ghent Hill Park is very much in the Spring spirit after all of the recent rain.

So, all of the rainfall lately has not gone to waste or been a total hindrance.

Far from it, actually.