Welcome the Lion Polar Bear

9MAR2005

Too funny, just as I said, it got cold. Worse, I never managed to get to that heat repair. It is currently about 9 degrees Fahrenheit. This is typical of our fine city. So no heat... And, colder still, I forgot my mother's birthday.

Well, it did get better... I fell asleep on the couch with the heating pad on my back, the house heat cranked and the TV on. My better half came home, discovered this and turned everything off. This was not good.

Now, keep in mind, my girl is from Japan. The houses of here region (near Tokyo) do not even have house heat. They have heaters for individuals. To them, my behavior was very wasteful. I am sure it never crossed her mind what turning off the heat would do to me in 9-degree weather.

When I did wake, I could see my breath and the thermometer read 46 degrees. Now that is the temperature I like certain beers but not my body. I turned up the heat and brewed tea.

I did manage to get some laundry done, some cooking and clean things up a bit but other than that I simply tried to defrost myself.

11MAR2005

The polar bear is continuing his romp through our area. We have reached the rank of the fourth snowiest winter on record and have but eight inches to go before we top the list. The forecast for this upcoming week is making it look like the goal will easily be reached. The weather we are currently experiencing is a bit unique to our region. It results from living so close to the great lakes.

I am, however, quiet used to it. I have lived in the greater Cleveland area my entire life and spent most of it living in regions we call "snow belts". Snow belts are areas just south and east of Cleveland were the snow tend to dump in greater amounts. (In the far eastern edge of the Snow Belt it is often easier to measure the snow in feet and not inches.) The "lake effect" occurs when cold air blows over the unthawed great lakes. The lake is, at the time, warmer than the air above so massive amounts of moisture evaporate from the lake and into the air. The air is somewhat warmed by the lake. The air then move to land, cools and drops its moisture.

I have seen lake effect go for weeks. I must confess that even though I am a winter kind of person, I am very tired of all this snow, cold and wind. I am too familiar with wind chill and then there is another weather phenomenon Cleveland commuters know all to well. I call it the "waiting time freeze factor". I works like this if you have to wait 4 minutes for a bus in 9 degree weather with a 25 mph wind it seems like you are waiting a little over an hour.

At present, I don't know the current temperature but I do know it is too cold. Spring is just weeks away but it seems like an eternity from now. I am looking forward to some spring, planting some herbs, and just not having minutes pass like hours.

13MAR2005

The "great white" continues... By the morning of the 12th, we were rapidly closing in on our new record here in Cleveland. We are currently measuring in at 96.1 inches (, as of Friday, March 11th,) of snowfall for this winter. That ranks us in third place. The record is 101.1 inches of snow. The forecast is calling for temperatures in the teens with "occasional snow" for the rest of the week. I quoted the phrase occasional because in the areas near the great lakes the weather is about as predicable as the behavior of a chronic acute schizophrenic who has been off their meds for a decade. Meteorologists leave this region in groves because the weather refuses to agree with them. "Partly cloudy" can change into three inches of white fluffy stuff on your driveway as easily and as frequently as Pamela Anderson's bra size.

This is not all bad though. First of all, we witness a lot of records. This is especially true recently with four of the top five placers occurring in the past decade and the last three seasons being the snowiest consecutive three-year stretch ever recorded. The other thing is that the weather is never mundane or boring here. If you don't like the current weather, just be patient 15 minutes to an hour and it will change. I have had little league games snowed out in June and worked in 78-degree weather in January.

At this point, I must ask. Would anyone care to enlighten me on all this global warming talk I keep hearing about?

I know that I included photos in the last personal blog entry but I am going to ask the reader to utilize their imagination for this entry. Close your eyes and visualize white. White in the air, white on the ground, white in your eyes white in your nose, white in your ears, cold white and cold white down the back of your neck all the way to your lower back. That is what it looks like outside.

If you want to even further push your imagination, mentally hear the sound of wind, a howling wind that screams "I am going to freeze you to death one extremity at a time". It screams that while simultaneously manically laughing. Now imagine even more. Feel cold, a cold in which you breath instantly turns from vapor to ice, a cold which sears the skin on your throat, the kind of cold that only cadavers and future meals should be exposed to. I think you get the picture now.

You will have to excuse me now. My hands have finally thawed out enough to hold the shovel. (I have been typing this "pigeon style" both hands tucked into my armpits for warmth, as I bend over the keyboard pecking away at it with my nose.) I need to go do the driveway again...

I will catch you all next thaw. Think warm thoughts.