The Daily Parker

Politics, Weather, Photography, and the Dog

Things in my Inbox

Some articles:

Today's other tasks include cleaning my house and writing code for about four hours.

Three unfortunate events on May 4th

Sometimes there are odd coincidences.

Three unfortunate events in the English-speaking world happened on May 4th. Here in Chicago, 130 years ago today in 1886, the Haymarket Riot occurred near the corner of Desplaines Avenue and Randolph Street.

Forty six years ago today in 1970, four students were killed at a nonviolent anti-war protest at Kent State University in Ohio. Tin soldiers and Nixon coming...

And 37 years ago today in 1979, Margaret Thatcher took office as the first woman Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, jolting the country rightward, destroying traditional English industries, and unsuccessfully trying to disenfranchise the poor and underclass.

But today, let's forget all that. May the Fourth be with you. And in honor of May 4th, it looks this morning like George Lucas has decided to stop beating his head into a wall, and is taking his museum somewhere else.

June to March in 12 hours

The Tribune has a graphic up demonstrating how Chicago temperatures dropped 20°C in one day. We went from a high temperature of 28°C at 4pm Monday down to a morning low of 7°C by 7pm Tuesday.

I should mention that I had several windows open Monday night, and closed them around 4am. That helped a little, but it would have helped more had I turned the heat on.

Despite the colder weather, through yesterday I've had six consecutive days of 15,000+ steps, including two of better than 20,000. Today looks promising as well. Fitbit also has a new feature that awards a pip for each clock hour in which you get 250 or more steps, the idea being to get you off your ass. I've got my app set to count from 8am to 9pm. Since Friday, I've had 13 of 13 hours four of five possible days—and today looks pretty likely as well. (The trick is to take Parker for a walk at 5 minutes before the hour, which gets me two pips in 10 minutes.

Decent weekend so far

Today's weather was finally spring-like, meaning twenty degrees warmer away from the lake than near it. But Parker still got over an hour of walkies, I've gotten (so far) about 18,000 steps, and all the windows in my house are open for the first time in about a month.

Also, I made a decent showing yesterday at a trivia tournament (tied for first place, but lost the tiebreaker), and today at a Euchre tournament (upper half of the pack, 7-2-1 overall record).

That is all. Time to feed the dog, and maybe walk another couple thousand steps.

Warm-weather fan

I went to my first Cubs game tonight after not entering the park for an entire season. As I write this, they're up 8-0 over the Reds going into the 9th. But I'm not there, because I didn't dress appropriately. By the end of the 4th inning my teeth were shivering. It's April; 8°C is not that unusual.

I'll be back, when it's warmer. Possibly by then the Cubs won't be in first place anymore. I think it's going to be a weird season.

Reading list

Here we go:

It's also a nice day outside, so Parker will probably get two hours of walks in.

Chicago from Space

Via Chicagoist, astronaut Tim Kopra snapped this from aboard the International Space Station earlier this week:

The city's borders show up brilliantly because unlike most of the surrounding suburbs, Chicago uses sodium-vapor lamps, which glow yellow-orange. But that's changing (including right in my own alley):

The Chicago Infrastructure Trust will replace the city's 348,500 outdoor lights with energy-efficient LED technology, according to a statement from City Hall. The Smart Lighting Project is aimed at making the city's lighting more environmentally-friendly and save money.

The LED lights would be significantly more efficient than the current sodium-vapor lights and would produce the same amount of light while using a fraction of the electricity, according to TimeOut Chicago. However, the new lights will produce a white light instead of the famous orange glow.

I have say, the LEDs are much more pleasant than the old lights, and they use just a fraction of the energy. But someday the city's outline won't be as visible from above.

I'd like spring again, please

After a much-warmer-than-normal early March, we've had typical Chicago weather for the first week of April. The Climate Prediction Center still says April might be warmer and drier than normal, but the 6-10 day outlook is just cold.

Today it doesn't know what to do. Walking from the train I got sun, snow, pellets, and mist. And it's barely 3°C.

So, it really is spring in Chicago, but I'd very much like the week we get (usually in May) when it's warm and sunny. Like we had at the beginning of March.