Warmish day, though I didn’t have a lot of time to spend out in it, other than walking the dog just before sunset. Windy but not especially cold then, but even better was the mid-day, when the sun came out and temps nearly hit 70 degrees F.
An editorial cartoon that assumed many, or at least some of its readers would know some Tennyson. Probably a reasonable assumption in 1945.
That came over the transom today in wandering around the online labyrinth. It is April 12, after all.
Not long after noon on Saturday, snow came pouring down. Large, fluffy flakes. That went on for a good while, though sometimes it was more like sleet, other times borderline cold drizzle.
It took a while to stick.
But eventually it did.
Been a cold spring most of the time so far this year, with lots of cold precipitation, chilly winds, overcast skies and mud underfoot. But I don’t want to be churlish about what our life-sustaining atmosphere is up to, at least if it isn’t a violent storm. Warmer or warmish spring will come. Saturday’s snow was gone by the end of the day Sunday.
Rain from early to late morning today, on 2/22/22, leaving large spring-like puddles, plus much mud, on my land. But now much colder air has moved in, pushing temps below freezing. Those puddles will be solid in the morning, but at least so will the mud.
Another bottle of Ninben brand concentrated soup base (kombu tsuyu no moto) has been emptied in this house. The last of went into the bowls from which we ate the fish and noodles and tofu and vegetables boiled in our nabe (鍋) pot this evening.
If that sounds like a good wintertime dinner, it is.
As for the soup base, it is the product of the Ninben Co. of Tokyo, whose roots go back to a salted and dried fish merchant in Old Edo ca. 1700.
Unusually detailed — if a little repetitive — verbiage on the label (not visible in the picture) says:
This is a concentrated soup base made from Japanese Hokkaido kelp, dried shiitake mushroom and authentically brewed soy sauce.
You can taste the rich soy flavor and umami of kelp and dried shiitake mushroom.
We do not use any high fructose corn syrup, artificial colorings or preservatives.
We do not use ingredients derived from animals.
A serving size is two tablespoons (30mL), including very little except carbohydrates and salt. Indeed, one serving provides 1200 mg of sodium.
Here we are, partway through paradoxical February, which is the shortest and yet the longest month.
Much of the snow has melted, but it will be back. Out in the front yard, near the front door, our metal frog peeps further out of the snow cover.
Elsewhere in the northwest suburbs, machines stand ready to deal with more frozen precipitation.
I’ve seen flags to warn, or assure, passersby about the solidity of ice, usually green or red for go or no go. But I’ve never seen one that hedges its bets. Red = no ice use. Yellow = own risk.
It’s theoretical for me anyway. I’m not about to walk out on any ice.
Compare and contrast, as my English teachers used to say.
Dusk on February 1.
Dusk on February 2.
For comparison, about the same framing — the view from my back door — but a whole lot of contrast. We caught the edge of the aforementioned winter storm on Wednesday morning. Not a huge amount of snow, just enough to be the usual pain in the ass.
Speaking of which, wankers are on the loose. They always are. Taken at a NW suburban gas station recently. No doubt posted by a true believer, unwittingly on behalf of the listed grifters.
One objection to the Covid-19 vaccine I find particularly irksome — one quasi-rational objection, that is, as opposed to the microchip ‘n’ such crackpot ones — is that it was developed too quickly.
True enough, it was developed much more quickly than any vaccine in history. Know what I’d call that? Progress. You’d be mistaken in believing Progress can cure all of mankind’s many ills, but it does a pretty good job in treating a lot of literal ills.
The other day I read about a woman who favored certain famous quack treatments for a relative dying of Covid-19, and who pestered his no doubt overburdened health care workers about it. One commentator on the situation said that the woman had attended the Dunning-Kruger School of Advanced Medicine.
Next, something a little lighter. Some time ago I was watching a video of “Puff the Magic Dragon,” sung in by Peter, Paul and Mary in 1986. At 2:53, the camera points toward a fellow in the audience, the one with dark curly hair — and instantly I recognized him.
That’s Dave, an old friend of mine I met in in the mid-80s Nashville, where he was from. Later we hung out in Chicago, since he went to graduate school there. These days he lives in Minnesota and teaches art. According to his Facebook page, he’s also a fellow at the Center for Residual Knowledge, Division of Other Things.
Bet I could get a fellowship there.
I didn’t realize the Winter Olympics were starting today until I saw it mentioned online. Upcoming events, according to the site, include figure skating, freestyle skiing, ice hockey, snowboarding, curling, bobsled and Uyghur internment, which is special to these Games.
Genocide aside, and that’s a big aside, I can’t muster much interest in the Games, except maybe for luge and skeleton, the events most likely to inspire spectacular accidents.
Sunny winter Sunday today, following snow last night, though only about two or three inches. Not enough to slow anything down. In the afternoon the back yard the sky looked about like this.
But I have to say that I took that picture four years ago in January. Pretty much all the Januaries here in metro Chicago have melded into a chilly gray blur. Still, the days are getting longer, which puts me in mind of days on the deck and distant roads.
Seems like the pit of winter has arrived. That’s not necessarily a time of blizzards or ice storms, though it can be. Mainly the pit is unrelenting cold, and some years the pit is deeper than others — more unrelenting, that is.
So far this year, winter has been bleak-midwinter-ish enough, but not viciously so in my neck of North America. There’s still time enough for northern Illinois winter to turn more vicious, of course.
Ann returned to ISU on Sunday, facilitated by me driving her there. It’s a task I don’t mind at all. We had a good conversation en route and listened to music we both like. I won’t go into the details of that right now, but there is a Venn diagram that includes some intersection. Larger than one might think.
Just before I returned her to her dorm and drove home, we visited part of Main Street in Bloomington. It’s an impressive block. Bloomington should be glad it has survived down to the present.
Not only survived, but the buildings are home to one kind of shop or another, mostly nonchain specialty retailers. In fact, all nonchain as far as I could see.
The 400 block of Main between Market and Monroe Sts. has the strongest concentration of late 19th-century commercial structures, with facades looking well-maintained in our time.
Featuring artwork from our time as well.
Not a lot of plaques that I saw, but I did spot one.
An organization that’s still very much around, but these days, the Harber Building is home to Illinois Tattoo. Ralph Smedley lived quite a long time (1878-1965), mostly in California, where the organization really took off.
Over a storefront occupied by Ayurveda for Healing, which promises a “holistic path for wellness and optimal health,” there’s a remarkable set of metal figures.
Detail.
Ayurveda for Healing, which I assume takes its inspiration from South Asian practices, has three locations, including this one in Bloomington, along with Chicago and Kalamazoo, Michigan.
Just a block over, the 500 block of Main isn’t what it used to be. This is what it used to be, in an image borrowed from the McLean County Museum of History.
This is what I saw, let’s say roughly 90-odd years later.
To take that image of the mural, I was standing in a parking lot where a Montgomery Ward store used to be. Too bad for what has been lost, but fragments are mostly what we have of the past anyway, and it’s good to spot them.
Just when the sidewalks were mostly clear of ice, along (on Saturday) comes freezing drizzle. Just after dark that day, Ann and a friend wanted to pick up a pizza, always a good goal, but I suggested that I drive, since I have a fair amount of experience with icy conditions.
The driving went as expected, a bit slick on the small roads, better traction on the larger ones. The first pizza joint we went to — which offers industrial pies for a fixed price (higher than it was last time, some moons ago) — was completely lighted but locked up. Odd for a Saturday night, but maybe that’s the labor shortage for you. Not actually a labor shortage, I suspect, but a wage shortage. Pay more and those workers will mysteriously reappear.
Would I be willing to pay even more for the pizzas as a result? Maybe. Then again, it’s completely mediocre pizza, best modified with additional toppings at home, to make it slightly better mediocre pizza. So maybe not.
We went to a more expensive place afterward. High mediocre, I’d say. It was open, but a sign at the door managed expectations by saying the place was short-handed, and the order did take longer than usual. I waited in the car while the girls waited inside, and I saw a parade of people come and go. Whatever the labor situation, the demand for high-mediocre pizza is certainly still there.
I saw another customer take a fall on the ice. She was walking in full view of me, and suddenly she wasn’t. But she got up and carried on, seemingly young and uninjured.
When we got home, I tested the surface just outside my car door. No traction at all. So I had Ann and her friend take the food in, and then spread the salt I keep outside, next to the front door, around the car to facilitate me getting into the house without a slip. I made it.
The sun was out today but temps weren’t warm enough to melt to ice, so I was out spreading more salt around. Now there’s traction, but even so, it was slow going taking the trash out this evening. But now it’s out and I’m inside, determined to stay a while.
Strong winds last night and into the morning. Strong enough that when I got up, I noticed that our sizable trash and recycle containers were both on their sides. I’d left them upright, ready for collection, the night before. I put on my coat and went out to stand them upright. An hour later, I noticed they were on their sides again. I set them up again and then quit watching.
Strong winds ushering in subfreezing temps, I should add. But no ice on the ground. That’s about all I ask from winter.
Received the following in an email today: “The Margaritaville USA Pickleball National Championships presented by Pickleball Central is USA Pickleball’s premiere event and features about 2,500 of the nation’s best pickleball athletes, including top players Tyson McGuffin, Matt Wright, Lucy Kovalova, Anna Leigh Waters and more…
“If you are interested in attending Media Day on Wednesday, or getting in touch with us for a future story, please see below.”
I wouldn’t mind writing about pickleball, at least occasionally, though I’m afraid it isn’t on my beat. Also, I wouldn’t mind being in Indian Wells, California, site of the event, about now. I didn’t know that anyone keeps track of the nation’s best pickleball athletes, but I do now. The thought of Media Day at the pickleball championships is also intriguing. Wonder how many journalists cover pickleball, even part time?
Cool nights, but not that cool, and warm days — at least through the weekend, according to forecasts. It’s that time of the year when summer ebbs away anyway.
As for Fairbanks, I don’t know whether dips below freezing count as the leading edge of winter, or merely a chilly fall. Anyway, summer’s done.
The crickets are still chirping by night hereabouts. But I find that if I leave the window open a crack to fall asleep to them, which I like to do, I sometimes wake up in the middle of the night sneezing. Not because of the crickets — I’m pretty sure — but damned lingering ragweed.
That happened more than once last night, despite a decongestant I took at about 2, and despite closing the window after the first time. I woke up tired this morning. I managed to get my morning work done, took a siesta in the early afternoon, and felt better after that, well enough to finish the day’s work. Such are weekdays sometimes.
When visiting Wisconsin recently, we wondered whether the dog would want to go swimming.
She did not, though a walk on the beach was fine.
Spotted at a shopping center parking lot recently.
The charging station appeared sometime recently, not sure when. Eventually, they might be so common that no one will comment on them, but I don’t think we’ve reached that point yet.
The Washington Post reported on September 14: “Automakers are betting tens of billions of dollars on the expanding adoption of electric vehicles in the U.S. But a big hurdle for some consumers is the much longer time it takes to charge an EV than it does to refuel a gasoline-powered car. Buc-ee’s Inc., a Texas-based chain of gas-station convenience stores that’s expanding rapidly in the Southeast, could have the answer.”
The gist of the story (for those who can’t access it) is that Buc-ee’s will make — has made — itself so interesting that people won’t mind spending extra time there to charge their cars. Could be. Or it might be the next step for Buc-ee’s toward world domination.
Skeptical? The article also says: “The chain’s origins and most of its locations are in Texas, but they’ve recently added two locations each in Georgia, Alabama and Florida, with new locations under construction in South Carolina, Tennessee, Kentucky and Mississippi.”