2 degrees and the dogs

[ctom]

We got a little "clipper" last night and I woke up to about an inch and a half of snow on everything, so I decided I'd get after it before the sidewalk got trod down and the drive had too many tires go across it. I didn't look at the thermometer as I put the gloves on along with the sweatshirt and opened the garage door. That lasted about 4 seconds. First I was hit in the face with wind hauling ice crystals and then I noticed that maybe I wasn't dressed quite right for this task. So after another sweathshirt...this one with a hood and a stocking cap to cover the bald spot I heaed back out.

I clear our stuff but do three neighbors as well. The cold air really clamps my lungs shut with the COPD but I have to stay exercised and shoveling seems to be a good way to do it. I pace myself and haven't had any real issues and besides, I get all this time to myself to think. lol

Before I left the garage the second time, I checked my handy dandy thermometer and it was sitting right at 1 degree. That explained the ice crystals. As I cleared in front of my garage and the driveway, I noticed the sun attempting to poke out and then, there it was. Complete with double sun dogs on each side. What a sight. But then with this wonderful north wind at something like 80 mph, clouds covered the sun and the dogs and I went back to the reality of shoveling. In the hour and a half, more or less, that I was dinging around out there I saw the dogs come out on a number of short occasions and they gave me a bright spot in all this work.

Now....as for my time thinking.....I fugured out that if Iowa would stop sucking and Canada would stop blowing we'de maybe warm up a little. We'd probably warm up real good if Iowa would blow and Canada sucked, but in all my thoughts I couldn't come up with a means to that end. Oh well...this is Minnesota, forever caught between those other two places and they're predicting a doozie for Friday, Saturday and even into Sunday. I was slated to be home alone for those days, but now it sounds like I have to cook as well as dig.  Can't win. But the dogs were still great today.

[gstott]

Welcome to my world.  That sounds like every morning for the past two months.  Except we have ice smog and the dirtiest air in the country.  It has actually been rivaling Beijing for how nasty it is.  Darned temperature inversions.

[ctom]

I've been reading about your air quality this winter. Rochester sits down in a hole and every now and again we get those inversions and man the air gets sour. We get the alerts often, but have managed to stay clear of them this winter. Ive been thru your neckof the woods several times....beautiful country out there. I've camped in some of the federal campsites east of Salt Lake City and along the border between Wyoming and Utah below the Grand Tetons. Hard to imagine having bad air there.

Ironic as it may sound, studies have shown that much of the air quality issues here come or start with air polluted along the Texas and Gulf states and follow the jet stream up.

[gstott]

That's crazy that your pollution comes all the way up from the gulf coast.  Ours is just a natural phenomena.  The inversions have always happened.  Early fur traders talked about it long before cars even existed.  Granted there are more particulates floating around in it now, but there just isn't much to be done about it.  I live about 100 miles north of Salt Lake on the Idaho border.  The winter here has been even more brutal than Salt Lake's.  This morning when I woke up, Salt Lake had a temp of 34, we were at 3.  There was dense ice fog once again on the way to work, making me late.  Tonight snow is supposed to move in, and I really hope it blows all this rotten air out.  It should be starting to warm up a bit by now.  I could really use a day in the 40s on a trout stream to knock the cobwebs out of my head.