sundaes and octopi

 Sundae, I know that word back from Gerties by the Colony Theater. both at 59th and Kedzie, where if you had a hot date for King of Kings say, you would drop by Gerties afterwards to further impress her with an ice cream concoction.  

Always a little puzzled by the spelling, but not enough so that I wanted to drop everything and look it up, and back in the old days I would have to haul out one of the books of that encyclopedia set that I slowly bought from the High Low, one book a week for a buck, and then if my information wasn't there I would not have a stack of other sources on the screen to check.

Life was tough then, but that's the way we liked it.

Sunday is a no brainer, it's an after church refreshment, but what of the spelling?  Wiki casually sez to protect from copyright infringement.  Lawyers, they make everything boring.

I came kind of close to becoming a lawyer.  Was all set to take the LSAT, but that morning I was woken by martial music and soon discovered that it was High School Marching Band Day.  Teenage girls in boots carrying wooden rifles.  I made my choice and I never looked back.  Lawyers, a lot of work, and you have to wear a suit like every day.  It seems like all other professions have made the jump to business casual or shorts and flip flops, but lawyers, who make the laws for Chrissake, are still wearing those damned monkey seats.  Go figure.  

Octopi, kind of the flavor of the month, they are everywhere these days, documentaries, books, articles in magazines, on the internet, just everywhere, and the 8 legs and the several pretty big brains, and likely the smartest animals south of the vertebrates, but other than that a little boring.

Except for that plural, and I can almost see The Scourge about to strike (though that would take about a month and a half), but who wants to say octopuses?  One syllable longer and trudging, without the gay elan of octopi.  

 The boringly pedantic guys in those other ivy towers (not to be confused with the bold free thinkers of The Institute) say, in their nasal voices, octopus is a Greek word, and the 'i' ending is a Roman thing, and therefore we should just use the English plural 's' because, because, we say so.  Well fuck em.  They should be made to give up their shorts and flip flops, and business casual and get back into those damn itchy monkey suits because this idea, that they can tell us how to speak English, is way lawyerly.       

April Fool

Now is a good time check in since the Institute is showing some signs of life but I'm not getting sucked into the nonsense that is the current socio-political reality despite its high entertainment value.  Meet the new boss, same as the old boss, and the beat goes on.

Thousands of years of wisdom, passed through many cultures, and look where we're at right now; pitiful, no?  It almost validates one of my crackpot notions that since human beings have no predators to keep the population in check Mother Nature has given us the tools to winnow the male population.  Unfortunately things have gotten out of hand with technological advances in modern warfare leading to needless collateral damage but that's a theory for another time.

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Maybe you'll find this interesting, maybe you won't.

https://www.forkingpaths.co/p/the-evolution-of-stupidity-and-octopus

What a world we live in

 I thought the two impeachments of Trump were misguided because there was no way they were going to get ten republican votes in the senate.  I was more favorably inclined towards the second because it was such an open and shut case, that even if it failed the exposure would sway some independents in the election.  We did win the election but I don't know that the second impeachment was much of a factor.

I happened to be watching tv when the reps presented the Mayorkas impeachment.  A bit of a solemn affair, about twenty of them including MTG who surprisingly was not screaming or anything.  Two days later the whole thing was in the dustbin and aside from a little whining by Mitch and Ted, the whole thing was forgotten.  Kind of like the impeachment of Biden and the investigation of Hunter Biden, no longer the shiny play pretties that they once were.

And anyway the republican congressfolk are much more interested in fighting among themselves, and now they can get back to what their voters sent them to congress for which is to bump off their speaker and fight to find a new one and then bump him off, and the beat goes on La-de-da-de-de, la-de-da-de-da

This Mike Johnson is a bible thumper and a Trumper to the max, but maybe not such a bad guy for us dems, not shutting down gummint just for larfs like a drunken teenager, and letting Ukraine getting the aid it so desperately needs.  

He was edging towards getting rid of the rule that it only takes one person to initiate the proceedings to dump him, but he backed off at the growl of Greene and Getz (the greasy grimy gopher guts twins).  But you know if it comes to that I am sure that there will be enough dem votes to keep him at his post.  

Of course there will be things that we will want of him, but we know we will have to give him some stuff too.  I would rather have us dems running things on our own, but bipartisanship is better than the reps running everything on their own, which lately consists of them running off their mouths while Ukraine burns.

And strangely we have the greasy grimy gopher guts twins (just had to say that again) to thank for this.

What a world we live in.

What Were They Thinking?

 I'm not exactly on Cliven's side, I'm just surprised that he can openly flout the law with impunity and get away with it.  It makes me wonder what we are paying the government people to do if not to enforce the law.  I said at the time that they were ill advised to try to round up hundreds of free-range cattle to satisfy Bundy's debt.  Why didn't they just slap a lien on his house or something?

Then there's Trump.  If he did half the things that they say he did, he should have been locked up a long time ago.  For instance, why did they wait three years to prosecute him for all that election crap?  I said at the time that the impeachment thing was a waste of time because they knew they didn't have the votes in the Senate to convict him.  They should have waited until the day after he left office and then charged him in a regular court.  That insurrection thing might have been hard to prove, but I'm pretty sure they could have easily convicted him of inciting a riot.  It might have been difficult to seat an impartial jury, but the same can be said about any high-profile case with all that pre-trial publicity. 

 Then there's all those other January 6ers.  Last I heard, they were trying to convict them under some obscure law that was probably intended to protect government documents.  They have these guys on video tape busting doors, windows, and climbing all over the Capital like a bunch of monkeys.  That should be enough evidence to convict them of something more tangible.  

draft

 I can't say that I ever thought much of Clive the deadbeat who grazed his mangy herd on federal land without paying for it as any good law abiding citizen would.  Nor do I have much sympathy for gun-toting Jan 6 types.

Of course I wasn't at the trial and the articles are short and sketchy as to what happened.  Maybe there were technicalities that I am not aware of, but more likely these guys just didn't like the gummint.

This may be an omen of something that I dread, a Trumper sneaking himself onto the jury in that Stormy Daniels case by covering up his tracks.  One monkey can stop the show.

Of course Trump may well end up in the hoosegow for just not keeping his trap shut when it comes to bad-mouthing the judge, the prosecution, family of the judge, family of the prosecution.  

Our buddies against Putin, the Ukrainians, are not doing so well of late, partly due no doubt to the Trumpers not wanting to give them any dough.  A sad and sorry state.  You know the Dems would be sending them plenty of arms.  Actually so would some of the republicans if they were allowed to vote on it.  

And now it looks like that may happen despite, or perhaps because of the shenanigans of the nuts of the freedom caucus.  They have forced Mike Johnson to go over to the dems for votes otherwise nothing would pass and bingo we have that heralded goal, bipartisan leadership.  The dems and the reps banging heads together and coming to some kind of agreement.  The way it should be instead of those endless tantrums of the Marjorie Taylor Green types.

This just in 4 or 5 hours after I wrote this it is announced that one of the jurors was likely a Trumper was caught lying about his history.  

 

Cliven Bundy Revisited

 Remember this guy?  Has is really been ten years?  Seems like only yesterday.

I find it hard to believe that he actually won his case.  Is this a great country or what?

Bundy family standoff: 10 years on, cattle graze disputed Nevada land | AP News

Jury refuses to convict 4 in Nevada ranch standoff retrial | AP News

The Eagle

 I too once had one of those ride the rails for free cards.  Courtesy of Blago before he went to the steel hotel in Colorado and they straightened things out a little.  I recommend also Aurora and Elgin both of which are pretty good sized and were their own towns for some time before the the broad shoulders gave them the big hug that turned them into drab and drear suburbia.

Back in the days when I lived in The Land of Milk and Honey when we drove back to Chicago there was always a sign on the interstate that pointed Chicago to the right, Memphis to the left.  Memphis, it sounded so far away and exotic, but we always went right to familiar and boring Chicago.

Likewise I think of Old Dog standing on that wintry platform and along comes the Texas Eagle, and he thinks what the hell.  He has that savoir faire such that no conductor would question him as he took his seat and before you knew it he would be dining on chiles relleno on the riverwalk in Old San Antone.

That was my train when I left The Little Nubbin of Nirvana.  I boarded about suppertime in Chicago.  At midnight I was passing through St Louis.  They had a couple of those big gambling boats at the time which lit up the night and the whole thing reminded me of the Susie Q scene in Apocalypse Now.  Holds up well.  Watch it again: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Decko2h-S20

The next morning we were moving through Little Rock, I treated myself to an exotic Belgian Waffle, which was a bit of a disappointment in that it was just a big waffle.  

And then it was on to the miles and miles of miles and miles of Texas, and late that night I was drinking Shiner Bocks along with a couple of my Champaign expats.

Turns out that when I settled down there I was only a block or two from where the Texas Eagle makes a turn from south to southwest on the way to San Antonio with a big blast of horn.  I tried to schedule my phone calls to around dinnertime so the listener would hear the blast and when they asked what was that, I would say, Why Son, that is the train to Old San Antone.

Another one of the bad things about being old is that there are no more big adventures, well no good ones.  In younger days Old Dog would have been drinking tequila out of dark eyed Senorita's slippers.  Nowadays he would have been rousted off the train at Pontiac to figure out his own way home.

Actually I am too old to be a boomer, the war was still going on in Japan when I was born.  Boomers didn't start until 1946, but I try to pass just for the glory.

And look at those balloons!  Not sure what to make of the one in the photo.  A motorcycle, or maybe an abstract?  Will likely have to wait a couple weeks for the response and maybe Old Dog will have moved to another adventure so maybe I will never know.

I know Old Dog is still kicking because he likes my weekly art post every Sunday.  But sure would be nice to hear more from him.

Child's play

Early spring?  Not so fast, Bubba!  Since that post there has been snow and temps in the 20s.  A fella could sprain his neck watching the thermometer go up and down but it is entertaining in a perverse, only Chicagoans get it, kind of way.

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A month without the wise counsel of Mr. Beagles, don't know what to make of that fact.  My delusional scenario is that he decided that maintaining 80+ acres is no way to spend his time and hitting the road with Lady Beagles would be much more fun.  Throw a camper thing on the back of the truck and just get the hell out of Dodge, could be in Nashville by sunset if he gets an early start.  Sounds like a good idea to me.  I have a card that gives me free travel on the CTA, RTA, and Metra trains so I looked at the Metra schedule and noticed that the Rock Island Line runs out of the La Salle Street Station and, if my memory of Johnny Cash is correct, the Rock Island Line is mighty fine.  Never been on that line so I went down and took the first train out of town and ended up in Joliet.  Nice trip, but on the return trip I ended up on the wrong platform and nearly boarded the Texas Eagle to San Antonio.  That would have been good, too.

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I'm guessing that Gage Park High School, Class of 1963, didn't have a 60th reunion last year or you guys would have mentioned it.  But you are the Silent Generation, after all.

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I'm starting to spend a little time at the local Senior Center and saw they have an occasional class on making balloon animals, something that should dazzle my niece's little ones.  A quick trip to a nearby Party Store and I'm getting a head start.  Before you start cracking wise check out the prices that Jeff Koons gets for his sculptures, and he doesn't even make them himself.

early spring

That whole rathole thing, I have to tell you I was not a big fan.  Oh I jumped on the bandwagon like everybody else it had a nice cynical vibe to it, but there was no actual animal to it like the alligator or the turtle.  It was just a little distraction in the winter.   And, except for that one big cold spell, not much of a winter.  And look what I spotted two days ago in the IBM planter across the street.

Time to get down to the garden store before they run out of tomato plants.

I wrote this a week ago.  I'd go out and get another photo of it but the sun has not yet risen.  

Meanwhile the Trumpist's case for impeaching Biden has fallen through since their main witness, who nobody outside of them ever thought was anything more than a Russian stooge, has turned out to be a Russian stooge.  But they are going to press on with it anyway because, because, Trump wants them to.  Not that that matters because no way is the senate going to vote against him, not that that matters either because, because, Trump wants them to.  

Meanwhile the Ukrainians, fighting on our front against the Russkies are running out of ammo, and the house can't find a way to give them any more dough because they didn't like the senate border proposal so the senate took it out, but then the house didn't like it because it didn't have a border proposal, but the real reason they don't want to give the Ukrainians any dough is because, because Trump doesn't want them to.

Meanwhile the sun has come out and I crossed State to get a photo of that shoot in the IBM planter.

Actually I am not sure if that is the same shoot as I posted last week, but hey close enough.  Daffodil I am guessing.

Warmest feb in history and I have to say I am enjoying it, even if it is  a harbinger of our doom from the hothouse effect.

Concrete evidence

When that story broke about the rat hole I was thinking, "Oh boy! Another opportunity to exercise my inner artsy-fartsy demons!"  Just gotta make a casting, then a plaster mold and then start cranking out ceramic replicas.  Ought to be a pretty penny in such an endeavor but Holy Moly it was cold that week and casting could be problematic.  And then I recalled one of those procedural cop shows on TV and they made a cast of tire tracks, in the snow, but they used sulfur, a technique I never heard of.   I was willing to try but I was fresh out of sulfur and it could be tricky showing up on a residential street with a camp stove melting sulfur.  Time passed, it warmed up but then everybody and his brother was showing up and just like that! the golden opportunity slipped away.  No worries, there will be others.

And speaking of sidewalks, I saw this warm sentiment scratched into the concrete near the Geezer Chateau.

Nighthawks

 Nighthawks.  Sure we have nighthawks.  Usually drop by it whenever I drop by the Art Institute,  The counterman is there because he is getting paid.  The couple are having a tryst, or maybe plotting a murder, likely her no-good hubby with the fat insurance policy.  But what about that guy with his back to us, the brim of his hat pulled down maybe a bit more than fashion would allow.  Is he an undercover copper or is he just a guy who likes a good cup of joe at two in the morning?  Why is nobody eating pie?

Can't say as I have every noticed the nighthawks here.  I don't remember them from Homan Avenue and probably they don't come downtown.  But it's nice to have something to welcome you to a new town.  In Champaign it was it was a Playboy magazine in an otherwise empty drawer in my dorm room.  In Herrin it was a big sign in front of  Red Top Liquors that read Cook's Beer, $2.80 a case.

That rat hole thing has been super-hyped here in Chicago.  Seems to me that since there is no real animal there like that Humboldt park alligator or that fat turtle in the river, that it doesn't deserve all that  attention.  But we Chicagoans like anything that can bring us together, and knocking catsup bottles out of tourists' hands in hot dog joints gets old after a while.

Will Wonders Ever Cease?

 Here's one for the "Every time you think you've seen it all, you find out that you ain't seen nothing yet." department:

The Chicago Rat Hole has charmed thousands. Neighbors have had enough. (msn.com)

I thought that Uncle Ken's mystery bird looked like a kestrel, except for the fuzzy head.  Kestrels are the smallest of the North American raptors and are sometimes called "sparrow hawks".  I tend to agree that the fuzzy head might mean it's a juvenile, although this doesn't seem to be the right time of year for that.  

I also remember a bird called a "night hawk" from Chicago, but I never saw one close up.  They used to soar high above the city lights on warm summer evenings catching insects in flight.  They usually hunted in pairs, calling back and forth to each other.  There was a pair circling over the Gold Front Bar the first week I spent in Cheboygan.  I took it as a sign that my destiny lay here.  

This morning's minion

 So look who I saw perched on my railing yesterday morning.  Never seen anything like this before.  Peregrine falcon I was thinking.  We have maybe a handful of them downtown hanging around our tall buildings and poaching pigeons at their leisure.  With our great hordes of pigeons (ungainly and almost comic as they plod the streets and sidewalks looking for a stray bits of potato chips dropped from the careless hands of munchers, but majestic when they all take flight at once, white wings flashing, then turn 90 degrees together and then again and again like a slow moving tornado into the sky) there are plenty to support hundreds of those falcons, but falcons don't like neighbors living to close to them.

Looked like a youngster, kind of soft and fuzzy in the face, not yet hardened into the cold and ruthless face of the predator.  This is the best of the three photos I could get of him before he was gone.  I looked up images of peregrine falcons on the computer, and he looked like them, sorta.  They were all adults without the soft and fuzzy faces, but they had that kind of stripe from the top of the head through the eye and down to, well the chin I guess.  I contacted my birdwatching sources to confirm.

Finches were the first to colonize my balcony, maybe ten years ago attracted here by sunflowers, and soon I was providing seed.  There were four of them, two couples, red faced males and all brown females.  They had graceful good looks and their song was sweet.  Pigeons came later.  I wasn't too happy about that, mainly afraid that my neighbors wouldn't like them (many people don't, refer to them as flying rats, but you know, they are God's creatures, as are rats for that matter) and I was afraid that that they would report me (against the rules to feed birds on the balconys) and I'd end up in the dreaded board's star chamber.

At first there were three of them, Mom and Pop and Junior I guessed.  They were pretty tame, I could almost touch them, so I got to be friendly with them.  But the one I assumed was Pop had a mean streak.  When I put seed down he would fight Mom and Junior for it, and even if I spaced the seed apart he would drive them away from the balcony,  Nothing uglier than a pigeon fight on your balcony.

And then I got these other birds, sparrows I call them, but they are just brown birds, kind of squat as opposed to the lean and graceful bodies of the finches.  And they don't travel in double dates, they travel in mobs.  The finches mostly graced the railing, but these guys are all over the floor of the balcony like, well a mob like I said.

Well speaking of the sparrows there was one on the floor of the balcony and at one point the newcomer made kind of a halfass dive at it, but maybe due to his youth it didn't work out and the sparrow fled.

The reports from my experts came in later, kestrel, kestrel, peregrine, but the last, seemed like the guy just said what he thought I wanted to hear.  I'm a little disappointed to hear.  Peregrine falcons sounds so much more noble than kestrel, like the difference between a privateer and a pirate.  But still kind of a nature experience for urban Uncle Ken. 

Hoity-Toity

So I'm noodling around one of my newsfeeds and up pops a list of the most famous restaurants in every state and what do I find?

MICHIGAN: Hack-Ma-Tack Inn and Restaurant in Cheboygan
"The restaurant features classic dishes like escargot, prime rib, filet mignon, and roast duck."

Well, La-de-DAH, but sounds a little pricey to me; I'll just have the horse-doovers.

"What"

Cool article, Mr. Beagles, something that I was not aware of.  Always good to learn something new especially the dynamics of storms in this era of climate flux.  Those patterns remind me of the swirling atmosphere you see in photos of Jupiter and Saturn and there is more than a passing resemblance in the design of the Tesla Valve.

So, did you have an entry in last weekend's Outhouse Race in Mackinaw City?  Rumor has it the winner was full of shit.

 

Say What?

 Y'all know anything about this?

https://www.msn.com/en-us/weather/topstories/this-weather-phenomenon-on-lake-michigan-stunned-meteorologists-friday/ar-BB1h5vI9?ocid=wi

Jabbering in January...

Running a little late but, "Happy New Year!"  Better late than never, as they say.

Wasn't that a delightful little break from the "urgency" of posting all the time?  Gave me time to reflect and ponder, an activity I can't get enough of but not to the point of where I'm going to share my thoughts.  Too much information these days if you ask me.  You didn't?  Oh.  Never mind.

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Glad to see Mr. Beagles is back, out and about in Cheboygan.  I still read the Tribune every so often, not as much as I should.  I saw that some grade school kids are raising a baby sturgeon to be set free this spring, not something I expect to read about in this neck of the woods.  What woods, you ask?  Not sure, but they're there...Urbs in Horto, cha,cha, cha.  And according to the Trib, this weather is the perfect time for folks to go owl watching.  Who?  That's right!

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Since Uncle Ken has the greenest thumb around here I was wondering if he had any house plants or are they all on the balcony.  Well, what's the story?  I know that houseplants can be problematic for pets and other children; most of the greenery I have comes with a warning.  There's a house a block or so away from me that has a nice little stand of bamboo; I'll have to talk to the owner about getting a cutting or something.  According to the local garden center, bamboo is considered an invasive plant and it's illegal to sell seeds but wouldn't bamboo make a swell addition to the jungle of The Geezer Chateau?  Grows like crazy, too.

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Remember that nice little watercolor of a spider that Uncle Ken shared a while back?  Here's a pic to show how big (or little) they actually are in case you were wondering.  Still cute, too.

 

 

diseases of our youth

 I don't remember the flu so much as I remember the rites of passage for kids of the day.  Measles, German measles, chicken pox, mumps.

Some kid up the street, or maybe it was you, would get it and then most of the neighborhood.  It was like no big deal, you'd be laid up for a week not feeling very well, but sleeping a lot so the time passed quickly, and there was this: no school.

For measles, and usually the rest, the room was dark.  I used to sneak a comic book by the window and pull the shade aside.  Later when it was discovered that I needed glasses, that was deemed the cause, my own bad behavior six years earlier.

But not only did you get to stay out of school but your wishes became commands.  "Oh Kenny, please eat something."  "I don't feel hungry."  "Please, anything."  "Well, maybe I could eat a bowl of grated cheese."  And there it was.  So great.  Probably Velveeta, but Velveeta was just fine with me at that age.

Poor Mom, washing, ironing, cooking, cleaning, and now a kid in bed that had to be catered to.  But that's the way it worked back in the days of Father Knows Best.

On the darker side there was polio.  Those dreadful iron lungs.   You were supposed to stay away from the beach, but we went there anyway.  It never came to Homan Avenue.  And then this guy Salk discovered a vaccine.  Big hero.

There was tuberculosis and smallpox too.  Their vaccine left a little scar on your left arm.  Going to check on my arm this morning after my shower.  I remember us being marched from the classroom into some room by the office and there was somebody with a white coat dunking a syringe into some jar.  We pulled up our sleeves and lined up.  I was not a burly lad, but I was not afraid of the needle like some kids were.  Sock it to me I proclaimed boldly baring my arm, but even then the hot babes were not impressed.

Anyway, even though those sicknesses were not that bad, they did take up easily a month of your life, not to mention the stress on Mom grating all that Velveeta, and sometimes kids did die.  They have all virtually disappeared from the USA and that is a mark of progress like washers and dryers and automatic transmissions, but now we have those damned anti vaxxers.  But I won't get into that now.  I am going to pop into the shower and scrutinize my left arm.

The Road to Recovery

 Remember when we had a bout with the flu as kids?  It was no big deal, a couple days of puking and shitting, then it was back to school like nothing happened.  Truth be known, that wasn't the same kind of flu that killed millions of people back in 1918, but that's what everybody called it.  I guess what I had this time was something in between, no puking and shitting, just loss of appetite, not only for food, but for everything else as well, including beer and cigarettes.  

Now I seem to be on the road to recovery.  Today I cleared the snow off of my truck, moved it, and plowed the part that the professional guy was unable to get to the two times he was here.  Clearing the snow off the truck would have been harder if my granddaughter hadn't done it a couple days ago when she came all the way from Petoskey to buy our groceries for us when I was still incapacitated.  We only got a few additional inches since then, and it was that light fluffy stuff that used to be normal for this time of year.  I haven't re-started the beer and cigarettes yet.  I don't miss the beer, but I do crave a cigarette now and then.  I find, however, that the craving goes away in a few minutes if I just ignore it.  I may never smoke again, but I'm not committing to that.  The last time I quit was for three and a half months when I had that bleeding ulcer back in 2008, and the only way I got through it was by telling myself that it was just temporary.  

the river

Close up of Thursday showing the path of the ice breaker

Wednesday 

                                                                        

                                                                     Thursday
 

We are getting two more single digit days and then it will be warming up.  I don't expect that we will be getting much more ice in the river out of this cold spell.

By the river

 I remember as a lad at Tonti Elementary school hearing about the the river and how it was reversed but it didn't make much of an impression on me at the time because I wasn't sure where the river was or even if it was in Chicago because you know how they go on and on about boring stuff, and anyway I spent a lot of time putting my pencil, eraser down, on the desk and making a slight shushing noise and raising it slowly up, point first, and the whole thing was a spaceship blasting off which was way more interesting than whatever Mrs Porwancher was droning on about.

Well you know, I lived in Chicago, so I pretty much  knew everything about it.  When I went downtown I was careful not to crane my neck up to look at the skyscrapers lest people think I was a tourist.  When I went down to Champaign I was all like what a podunk, though later I was so fond of my beer drinking buddies that I began to think of it as the land of milk and honey.

But when I went to Texas, well Son, that was something altogether different.  Illinois was just where people went when they thought Indiana was too full, but Texas, what a story.  And when I took the bus downtown from South Austin and we crossed the Colorado River everybody set down their newspapers or whatever, because this was before phones, imagine that, and looked down at the sparkling river and its well adorned banks and let out a sigh because it was a pretty little thing.  Well I did.  

Well I have gone far afield as I often do.  Just so happy to be typing with a cup of coffee at my side in the morning.

Anyway now I live right on the banks of the river and I know the river well.  

Those photos are kind of trick shots, making use of where the narrow sunbeams shoot down the streets between the buildings to accent the steam.  But it has been a pretty mild winter up till Sunday so the river is pretty warm and the air is like really, really cold.  

The current is pretty sluggish and we always get some ice on the river.  Every five or ten years it does freeze over entirely from Wolf Point to the mouth but then they bring out a little ice breaker and, like a tractor in the spring, it ploughs a little path in the middle of the river.  If it's a pretty cold day you can see steam rising behind it.  Pretty cool.

Less than half an hour till sunrise which will let me see the river better and I will check for ice.

This is an hour later, plenty of steam but no ice.  Here are a couple photos from about ten years ago.

Shiver Me Timbers!

I have been sick with the flu the last few days, so I have been spending a lot of time watching the Weather Chanel, and I noticed that youse guys have been even colder than us'ns lately.  That's unusual but not unheard of.  While our weather hasn't been exactly tropical, we haven't gone below zero yet this winter, and I hope we never do.  As far as I'm concerned, zero ought to be cold enough for anybody.  I mean, why do they even call it zero if they want to get even colder than that?  Anyway, being down with the flu, I actually had to pay somebody twice to plow our driveway, the first time in the 23 years at this location.  Of course I've been sick before, and we've had tons of snow in our driveway before, but never both at the same time.  I'm feeling better tonight, so maybe I will be able to keep up with it from now on.

Those are neat photos of the Chicago River all steamy.  I suppose the current is swift enough to keep it from freezing over most years.  Does it ever?  

Pictures are worth thousands of words