Events

I exaggerate. But officially, at 8:51am this morning O'Hare reported a temperature above -7°C, finally ending our 12 days of frigid temperatures. Parker got a real walk this morning, and he's about to get another one. And no boots! Most of the salt has been brushed away from the sidewalks. Of course, it's supposed to snow later today. But it's also forecast to hit -1°C today and (gasp!) 8°C on Wednesday. Anyway, I'm happy, and Parker appears to be, that walking outside does not immediately result in...

The good news: our cold snap is almost over. Temperatures will rise all day tomorrow and actually get above freezing tomorrow evening. The bad news: We're about to tie a record for the longest period where the temperature stayed under -7°C in Chicago history: Charles Mott, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service in Chicago, said it’s unlikely the temperature Saturday would get above -7°C, which would tie a record of 12 days of temperatures that haven’t gotten out of the teens. Many days the...

All the news yesterday and today has talked about Mike Wolff's new book, and how it puts into black-and-white terms what we already knew about the President. I'm reading a lot of it, and I've even pre-ordered David Frum's new book, coming out a week from Tuesday. Fortunately, Chicago magazine published an article today about the origin of time zones in the United States, which is political but only in the nuts-and-bolts sense and not really in a partisan way. And Chicago has the story because...

Photographer Mark Holtzman flew a Cessna 206 over the Rose Bowl on Monday—and captured one of the coolest aerial photos I've ever seen. He explains the shot in The Atlantic: I’m always talking with them. It’s run under the Pasadena Police, so I get a clearance. They don’t want anybody just flying around during a big event like that, even though you theoretically can. So I was on a discreet frequency, the same frequency as the B-2, talking to them. They know me now. Unlike film, the way you shoot digital...

James Fallows points out the alarming parallels between sexual harassment in Hollywood and President Trump's manifest unfitness for office: In the very short term, a few people reflexively offered “open secret” as an explanation, even a rationalization. Of course everybody knew that Harvey/Roger/Kevin was this way (the reasoning went). If you were smart, you kept your distance, and you’d never take the bait of going for “a meeting” up in the hotel room. Want to give, or get, a “massage”? No way! But you...

My step count over the last week and a half has really suffered. Between Arctic temperatures and working from home (and a dog who hates boots), my average over the last 7 days of 2017 was just 8,441 steps per day. Throughout 2017, I only missed 10k steps 26 times—6 of them between Christmas and New Year's Eve. This weekend should be warmer, and I'm back in the office this week, so I expect better results going forward. Both yesterday and Monday I hit my 10k goal, and today I'm likely to. But wow, I hate...

I will not be doing this (though I am taking it easy this month): After a week or so, I’m sleeping better and have noticeably more energy. However, because my job is literally to go to bars and clubs, I can’t board myself up in a room, “Trainspotting”-style, to avoid temptation. I still go to cocktail bars and check out DJs and bands — I just don’t drink while doing so. Thankfully, with the explosion of the District’s drinking scene, more bars are putting an emphasis on house-made sodas and fresh...

It turns out I'm still right about two things I said yesterday: First, yesterday did set the record in Chicago for the coldest January 1st on record when the temperature only managed to get up to -17°C. (The previous low-maximum record was -15°C set in 1969.) Second, last night's overnight minimum temperature was a full half-degree C warmer than the overnight low on January 1st. So far, then, January 1st is still the coldest day of 2018. That said, I did not enjoy my commute this morning.

Just 3% of New Year's Days have been this cold in Chicago since we started keeping records in 1871. The normal temperature range for January 1st is -9°C to -1°C; right now it's -17°C, noticeably warmer than the overnight low of -23°C. That overnight temperature actually tied for the second-coldest January 1st on record. Only 1969 was colder. If the daytime temperature stays where it is, we'll set a new record for the coldest January 1st in history. The forecast calls for warming temperatures next...

2017 is officially over for us here in Chicago. Let auld lang syne be forgot; we've got 309 days until what all my friends (except that one guy) hope will be a corrective election. We're also hoping for warmer weather, which is actually more certain to happen, and sooner, than the Democratic Party regaining power in the U.S. Still, we can look forward to the future, and hope.