It was still -1 F at 9 AM here. HD and I went skating on our favorite shallow vernal (dries out) pond the last 3 days, but at about 15 deg yeterday was a bit cold. The forecast is maybe it will go above freezing in 11 days. But, before that it will get to -6 F (NWS) or -15 (local TV) Friday night. We are near 39 deg N, and local TV reports this will be coldest since 2001, and NWS that it will be longest stretch of sever cold in 22 years or something like that.

HD and I went down to watch the ice flows flow by with the rapid current yesterday sunset. It was silent, but in a week may be thick ice crashing into itself.

I am going to be very tempted to skate on the giant Lake of Ozarks in a week. Hope I don't drown my fool self. HD will be safe back in Santa Cruz.

I'll be entertained/dismayed by the editorials, letters, and printed anonymous calls in the local paper the next couple of weeks saying what a hoax global warming is.

If global temperatures have averaged a 1 deg F increase since 1950 or so, and there are much larger increases in the Arctic and a few other places, the variability should swamp the warming in other areas like here for now...now being a decade or so.
Chris