Its all balanced out in the big picture. But as I said... most people have a recency bias and recently it has been consistently wet and chilly. I think most people would prefer to get to normal with more rapidly alternating patterns. But it seems like we usually run in long streaks at this time of year so if you ask at the end of a cold/wet streak like now... people will say its been unusually gloomy. Its pretty simple to understand.
It’s still the best thunderstorm I’ve ever seen in the Puget sound region. I remember the marine layer clouds just suddenly becoming almost black with huge bolts of lightning seemingly out of nowhere. The sky was like a strobe light for 4-5 hours that night.
Cloudiness, precipitation, and temperatures have been essentially right at the 30yr average across WA/OR over the last 3 months.
Which is unusual given the context of a post-niño spring but very run-of-the-mill in the grand scheme of things. 1988 and 2010 are the closest matches w/rt tropical convection and general circulation following strong niños.