Windy, Snowy

Winter                               Waning Moon of Long Nights

We have a light snow here in Andover this morning, winds gusting as high 21 mph yielding windchills in the -5 to -8 ranger.  The ice below the snow continues to give its raggedy feel to driveways and sidewalks and side streets.

The bulk of this system, both in snow and wind, lies west and south of us, though we will see -20 to -30 windchills by tonight and tomorrow morning.

Waiting on a call now from Toyota about that flat tire.  Meanwhile, that new novel keeps chugging along.

Feeling Flat

Winter                                 Waning Moon of Long Nights

Off to Carlson Toyota this morning with the Celica for an oil change.  Not noteworthy in the course of things, but as I neared Carlson, a funny sound came up from what I thought was the right side of the car.  It was my left tire going flat.  flattire-main_fullWe limped into the dealers and ended up with a new tire on order since I shredded this one by driving on it.  I thought it was an engine problem.  Geez.

Notice for a docent discussion group meeting went out this morning.  My mid-winter idyll will end when I take off for Denver.  After that life will begin to get busy again.  Fine with me.

Warmer today.  12.  Feels balmy.  Strange.

Stuff Going On

Winter                               Waning Moon of Long Nights

We’re in to another night of below zero temps.  This is striking because our really cold weather usually doesn’t show up until the third/fourth week of January.

More writing today.

Decluttered many areas over the last month or so.  Work streamlined and feels good.  I like having multiple projects of a different sort underway and the current collection fits the bill.  I have a justice project–the Sierra Club, an aesthetic project–the MIA, a creative project–the new novel and Liberal II, and a gardening project–well, it’s almost time to start the leek  transplants and fire up the hydroponics.

Time Enough

Winter                                     Waning Moon of Long Nights

I’ve had a long stretch of no tours at the museum, little direct work for the Sierra Club and, of course, no gardening.  That means I’ve had plenty of time to focus on writing and I’m well into a new novel and have the research underway for Liberal II:  The Present.  It’s nice to have extensive time at home, especially when the weather has been as brutal as it has been.

The act of writing has a therapeutic edge, no matter what form the writing takes, but when the writing is fiction, something else comes into the act.  I don’t know what it is, other generations have called it the muse, inspiration, an angel, a devil but it does feel like there’s a second party in on the action.

We got our mutual present to each other today, a Kitchen Aid Artisan stand-mixer.  Bread and pasta are on  my mind.  As Kate has been home since mid-October, I’ve noticed a tendency to put more time and love in to the act of cooking and to put more of a focus on the kitchen.  I enjoy it.

Cold Weather Merit Badges All Around

Winter                                     Waning Moon of Long Nights

Warm up coming.  Low this a.m. only -16.

Forecast

The consensus among forecasts and forecasters has some snow coming to us tomorrow and Thursday, perhaps enough to cause problems for the commute, but not enough to bother us at home here in the northern ‘burbs.  Another consensus has that snow followed by more arctic air, with windchills Friday clocking in at -20 to -30.  Again there is a consensus that the next week should see a real warm-up with temperatures perhaps rising as high as 30 degrees.

Each Minnesotan will get a cold-weather merit badge mailed out by the Association of Weather Warriors (Aww) sometime around the summer solstice.  Suitable for the car window  or now in lapel pins as well.

How does it go?  There are many cold Minnesotans.  There are many bold Minnesotans.

Woolly Monday

Winter                              Waning Moon of Long Nights

Woolly Mammoths

And a Red Stag

In the Black Forest.

Woollys met tonight at the Red Stag.  Ode takes off for Mexico Wednesday morning.  Taylor is getting booted out of the teen cd program.  Bill’s brother with prostate cancer and the 500 PSA lives on, long past the four months projected last summer.  He’s using naturopathic methods.  Scott’s daughter and baby Lela are doing well.

I took Frank home tonight.  The cold weather is tough on his heart condition, as, apparently, too, is eating.  Glad he got home safe.

Food, Tea, More Food, Nap, Food

Winter                                      Waning Moon of Long Nights

Kate and I had our business meeting, checking this box and that, doing those things couples need to do to keep life solid and sane.

Afterward, we saddled up the old Tundra and drove her over to the Maple Grove shopping area where we made investments in food:  12 qt. stock pot, melamine mixing bowls, a scraper or two, some coffee and dish towels.  I also purchased bulk tea at Tea Vana, but was disappointed to learn that they no longer carried my long time favorite:  lapsang souchong.  The kind guy behind the counter found a bit extra for me from his private stash.

After lunch at Biaggia’s we drove home for our nap, from which I just got up.  Next on the day’s agenda, drive into the Red Stag and eat dinner.  Do you see a pattern here?

Welcome, North Pole Air Mass!

Winter                                    Waning Moon of Long Nights

Each year around this time we begin to get the full slump of arctic air, air not held back by the jet stream or weather nwsc1410patterns here in the upper lower 48.  Turns out it’s cold up there at the north pole even with global warming.  That means we get these stretches of what people in Sun City would call cool weather.

Right now the trend is up.  The low last night was -16.  This does not,  however, qualify as a grab the beach towels and sunscreen sort of warm up.  Nope, this is a Minnesota heat wave where cars start again, that kid with his tongue on the lamp post might be able to get free and ma can slide the clothes off the line since the clothes pin will open again.  It’s not so much of a warm-up that Ole has to bring his pick-up in off the lake or that Peder has to give up on that snowmobiling idea.

The trend, to be more accurate, is up briefly, then back down again.  Oh, well.

More cold. More often.

Winter                                      Waning Moon of Long Nights                -13 (low -25)

Well, we did hit -25 again, this time at 6:49 a.m.  The sun seems like an exercise in futility, but even with the high albedo of 100% snow cover, we still get solar gain.

Try to imagine what we’d be like here without the sun.  That’s the reason all those folks spend so much time celebrating nwsc1310the daylight side of the Winter Solstice.  If the sun kept disappearing for longer and longer chunks of time, and the temperature grew more and more severe, then, if  you had little understanding of astronomy and believed the sun’s return depended on the favor of this god or that, you could have come into the time of winter solstice hoping, but not being sure, that the sun would return.

Think how happy you would be with even this weak soup of solar particles.  At least there is light, and, thank Brigit or Apollo or whoever, it seems like there is more light.

More cold.  More often.

So Cold I Forgot to Post This

Winter                              Waning Moon of Long Nights                   -18

Since it is -18 now, at 11:15 p.m. it will get cold by morning.  Don’t know whether it will reach -25 as it did this a.m., but it would not surprise me.

Kate has been reading and reading and reading.  Ever since we got her a Kindle for her birthday back in August, she’s used it a lot.  Over the last few days she’s gone on a real tear.

I’ve been reading a good bit, too.  Current book, The Glass Devil, by Helen Tursten, a Swedish mystery writer.  Almost done.  A bleak book in many ways.  Put alongside the Girl Who Played With Fire and the Girl With The Dragon Tattoo, however, it paints a consistent picture of Sweden.   Clean, minimalist, family oriented with a certain sexual candor.  Educated, but somewhat insular.  (peninsular?) Also heir to all the vices that plague us all:  sex, drugs, violence, gangs, family dysfunction.

Well, ok.  I’m also reading Descarte’s Bones, a great read from Mark Odegard.  A Short History of Daoism.  Those are my main efforts right now.