Winter is Here

Well, worries about global warming aside, winter has arrived a few weeks late, but here at last. We've had our second heavy snowfall of the month and temperatures are in the 20's (Farenheit that is, for people who live in the rest of the world). I went to the University of Chicago campus to look for a few good pictures and here is what I came up with.

Global Snowing

Well, winter was a little late in arriving but it's here! We get to participate in all those delightful activities such as making puddles on the floor of the house with melting snow, listening to the anti-lock brakes go as your car slips on ice and, of course, my personal favorite--shoveling! Fortunately fresh snow is pretty enough to almost make up for the hassles.





Of course if you don't like winter you can always make like a cat.

Shadowed

My son and I were playing with our shadows on a walk we took over vacation. Three to six inches of snow heading my way today. I miss the sun.
Our weather reports are increasingly histrionic. No snowpocalypse comments, after all six inches is quite manageable, but the report I read included such phrases as: "extremely hazardous travel conditions," "very slippery roadway conditions and very poor visibility," and "plummeting temperatures, snow, howling winds and blowing snow." Aack, we're all going to die!



I've my 35 minute each way commute today under these terrible, very dangerous, frightfully frightful conditions. I'll let you know tomorrow if I survived. Have a nice day. S

Foggy, Foggy

So far Spring has been painfully cold and wet. I so would like to see a day or two of 60 degrees and sunny. I feel moldy.

Ghostly Tree

During the great blizzard of 2011.

Thursday Challenge: Trees

Just Say No to Snow

I have a photographic collection of these neighborhood block club signs. I find them an intriguing bit of urban sociology.
By the way, the snow is melting fast. Fortunately blizzards are ephemeral, as is winter. We are so looking forward to spring here.

Lensday, Signs.

Walk the Drive

I've only seen Lake Shore Drive closed on a few occasions--immediately after the July 3rd fireworks downtown, and for the annual Bike the Drive event. Last week's blizzard closed it too. Walking across it, I kept expecting to get mowed down by a motorist.

Nicely Ice Suffices

Fire and Ice

Some say the world will end in fire,
Some say in ice.
From what I've tasted of desire
I hold with those who favor fire.
But if it had to perish twice,
I think I know enough of hate
To say that for destruction ice
Is also great
And would suffice.

Robert Frost

Back in a by-gone era when us kids had to memorize poetry in junior high school, most of my classmates picked this one for its brevity. Being proudly original and a bit of a suck up I picked another, longer poem but I heard this one recited in class so many times that I had it memorized anyway.



Contrary to popular opinion, Chicago did not perish in the storm yesterday but it did close down. Except for people shoveling which brought out the entire community in a good-spirited way, Chicago put up a big sign saying, "Closed for the duration."



Lots of fuzzy--hatted folks were out with their digital cameras and cell phones taking pictures for posterity so my photos are not especially original. It made for a fun outing although my thighs, knees and back are now protesting the unaccustomed wading through drifts.



The civic spiritedness will end as soon as the fighting over shoveled parking spaces begin but it was fun while it lasted. I did chat with one University of Chicago graduate student who was forced by his advisor to remain on campus for a seminar Tuesday night and wound up sleeping on the office couch.
Life was not so good for the poor folks who wound up stranded on Lake Shore Drive. Fortunately I was working in my local office and only had to drive the mile to pick up my son from school, which was challenging enough.



Two days off of school is making the kids happy. I still haven't quite figured out if any of my patients plan on coming in today. This will decide if I have to make the frosty drive to work today. It is only 10 degrees F. so I'm not particularly looking forward to going out. The sun is shining though so it should be a pretty commute.

When in Doubt. . . .

Write about Chicago weather. It is always varied, always interesting. Well, maybe not so much if you don't live here.
I haven't found much going on in my head worth writing. I can't quite tell you why that might be so; it just is. We had a warming spell here (meaning slightly above freezing) and much of our accumulated snow melted but it has been gray and gloomy. It felt even too dark for a photo outing. But this morning I awoke to the dulcet tones of my clock radio saying something about "blizzard." I honestly thought at first I was hearing the weather on the East Coast. But no, weather is arriving here tomorrow. I haven't shoveled snow in at least a week and I was definitely getting out of shape.



I was reviewing my photos of Spain and found that what I assumed was a clock was instead a weather gauge. I see on it "Muy seco" but whatever the Spanish word for blizzard is, it isn't up there. Anyone up for a trip to Madrid?

Let It Snow

It's not like we have a choice.

Playing with Snow

Not snowballs or snowmen but snow photos. Using different lenses and manual settings changes the image in dramatic ways.

Happy Mother's Day

My family took me out to brunch and then we rented a tuxedo for my son's senior prom. It was quite a family milestone to see my son dressed in a tux (only the top half for the fitting--we see the ensemble when we pick up the whole package prom weekend).
I tried to go for a walk on the beach this evening but went too late. A 69 degree afternoon fell to 43 in the past two hours! Brrrr! So I took a few pics with the last of the day's light in the backyard and am now camping out with a cup of hot tea and a space heater. I grew up in Seattle. The weather variation of an entire year there can be encompassed in one afternoon in Chicago. I'm not joking!
Happy Mother's Day to all those who care. To those who don't, I hope you have a good week!

Snow in April

It seems to happen every year. The flakes were especially large and fluffy so I tried to catch the effect using a long exposure with forced flash. I think it came out pretty well.

Yes, Thank You, the Frostbite is Healing Just Fine

Just kidding, but my fingers were getting pretty cold taking this photo. Not to mention my toes. It was around -7 F at the time. Cameras don't like weather this cold either. I'm pleased mine managed.
Speaking of managing, lots of cold cars here. I had a patient cancel last night because her car wouldn't start. This made me all the more anxious as I strolled out to my car at 9:30 last night after it had sat outside for nearly 10 hours. Fortunately the engine turned over and my car and I made it home (to a heated garage no less--nice but you should see my gas bill!)
This morning my son was carpooling to an event and I had to race out of the house at the last minute to jump his ride's car. I'm assuming he didn't miss the bus since we haven't gotten any phone calls. He'll be in St. Louis which I assume is warmer than Arctic Chicago.
Brrr!

Icicles

The view from my office fire escape yesterday.

Planes, Taxis, Buses and Hiking

Well, another vacation rife with weather delays. Our trip started Sunday with the cancellation of our flight from Chicago to Seattle due to a blizzard in Seattle, of all places. I can't tell you how exciting it is to take a round trip vacation to O'Hare airport. Not to mention that our luggage could not be retrieved when they canceled our flight.
The next flight we could get to the West Coast was two days later to Vancouver, British Columbia. Now, Vancouver is one of my favorite cities in the whole world but that didn't make it convenient under the circumstances. We were able to fly to Vancouver Tuesday but only barely given the weather there. They too were having intermittent airport closures. We met a gentleman in Vancouver who had flown from Toronto en route to Sydney and had been in Vancouver for two days already.



So there we were in Vancouver, our luggage allegedly in Seattle. We checked in to a hotel and tried valiantly to get a rental car. No cars to be had in the entire region! We managed to find a bus to take us to downtown Seattle despite plenty of snow in both Vancouver and Seattle.



We also managed to take in a wonderful Chinese dinner and a great Chinese breakfast (my first) near the airport and did some frantic last minute shopping in a pan-Asian shopping mall across the street from our hotel. Then off to the bus.
Some 6-7 hours later we arrive in Seattle only to be told that there are no taxis available. Fortunately as our cab driver later explained that was a lie. The hotel had a deal with a private operator and was shunned by local cab agencies. We flagged down a cab by the Seattle Center and headed to my father's house. Alas the cab could not make it up the final snowy hill and we had to walk the last 10 blocks or so. Hiking up a snowy hill seemed the fitting end to our trek, or almost. I say almost because we have yet to see our luggage. It might be at the airport. Then again, who knows? If we can make it from where we are currently staying to the airport tomorrow, we will try to retrieve our stuff. Until then we survive on borrowed clothes.



But our spirits are bright though the skies are gray and snowy. I finish with a quote from my older son after an hour of sledding: "Ahh, my butt is cold!"
Happy holidays to all!
Sarala

Rain, rain go away

Saturday the area was deluged with water setting a new local record. The rain seemed to start on Thursday and didn't stop until Sunday. Soccer was canceled and we didn't get out much all weekend.
The good news is my house didn't take any water. The bad news--my husband's car was in a flood area and likely was totaled. There was "marital discord" over his car purchase, to say the least, so I wasn't too perturbed by his "loss." It is covered by insurance anyway.
My condolences go out to those who truly suffered from the most recent floods in the Midwest and elsewhere.

Severe Weather

Wow! Tornado warnings here in Chicago! The worst has passed and all we have at present is a gentle rain but we had quite the lightning show earlier. I actually had patients holed up in my office for a few minutes until the worst passed by. I had to run home since my son was panicking.
I first heard our local tornado sirens a few years ago (and blogged about it here) and didn't know what they were. Today when they started wailing, the storm hadn't quite arrived yet and I was puzzled. Then the show began. A check of the internet suggested possible tornadoes to the south and north of me but none nearby. Now it is not clear if there were any actual tornadoes sighted. In fact, I'm still not sure if there were any tornado touch downs in the greater Chicago area.
News has it that Wrigley field was evacuated during a game. That must have been exciting. And passengers at O'Hare were taken off their planes and evacuated to a lower level. Of course, multiple flights were canceled.
I'm not flying until Sunday. We had to deal with cancellations on my last trip and I hope this time the weather will be kind to us.

Signs of Spring?

This morning I felt a certain evidence that spring might yet appear here in Chicago. The morning was bright and I had less trouble waking up than usual. I heard a cardinal singing his heart out. The never ending snow has finally melted except in a few shady spots.
Of course, the grass is still brown--it will be a few more weeks before it starts to green again. My backyard looks more like a swamp than a yard. I'm still missing the robins, white throat sparrows and migrant finches. The trees won't leaf out for at least another month, maybe more. And it will, inevitably, snow on April Fool's Day.
The calendar says spring will be here in less than 3 weeks. The clocks change (spring forward) next weekend. The days get longer and longer. Catalogs and magazines are featuring Easter. College kids will soon be studying for finals. My father is bugging me about our summer plans.



I'm eagerly awaiting snow drops, garden planning, pansies, goldfinches, the dawn chorus, late sunsets, pumping up the bike tires so we can ignore them for another year. In the meantime, I need to get a sweater; I'm cold.

Fridge Fetish

Just a follow up to all those who enjoyed a peek in my fridge. I downloaded same photo to Flickr and got invited to post the photo to a group called "Fridge Fetish." I cannot tell you what a relief it is to know that my fridge is no more packed full than a lot of other people. Of course it isn't exactly a scientific sample, but there you have it.
Speaking of fridges, it is -1 degrees F. today. Aaack. And more snow tonight.