The Chicago Tribune reported this morning that average Chicago temperatures have remained above normal month by month for the past nine in a row:
The temperature trend to date may be among the most remarkable on record for the period here. November 2010 is to become the ninth consecutive month to close with a temperature which has averaged warmer than normal. That's a nearly unprecedented accomplishment. It means meteorological spring (March through May), meteorological summer (June through August) and meteorological autumn (September through November) have each finished above normal. An in-house analysis of Chicago's seasonal temperatures indicates there have only been two instances since Midway Airport observations began in 1928--the years 1998 and 1999--in which spring, summer and autumn have ALL been above normal--including each of their constituent months!
The report also mentions we've had the sunniest autumn in 11 years.
Of course, it's almost December, which means relative warmth can still mean absolute misery. Alaska has sent us a storm which should arrive Saturday morning, bringing the first significant snowfall of the year.
This month has set the record, and it's only the 22nd:
Chicagoans have been soaking up sunshine at a record rate this month in what has been the sunniest October to date. So far this month the city has recorded 86 percent of its possible sunshine, surpassing the previous Oct. 1-21 record of 84 percent established in 1958. Another mostly sunny day is on tap for Friday before a weekend storm promises to bring extensive cloudiness along with the city's first significant rainfall since October's opening three days....
And then there's the new sunshine provided by Wikileaks:
The reports make it clear that most civilians, by far, were killed by other Iraqis. Two of the worst days of the war came on Aug. 31, 2005, when a stampede on a bridge in Baghdad killed more than 950 people after several earlier attacks panicked a huge crowd, and on Aug. 14, 2007, when truck bombs killed more than 500 people in a rural area near the border with Syria.
But it was systematic sectarian cleansing that drove the killing to its most frenzied point, making December 2006 the worst month of the war, according to the reports, with about 3,800 civilians killed, roughly equal to the past seven years of murders in New York City. A total of about 1,300 police officers, insurgents and coalition soldiers were also killed in that month.
Endless war.
(Apologies to Bill Cosby.)
The Chicago Tribune reported today that Chicago needs more software engineers:
With a national unemployment rate of 9.6 percent, many people assume employers have their pick of applicants for any job, McCombs said. Not so. Within every down job market exist bright spots, which in Chicago means tech jobs, particularly for software engineers.
The continued growth of the Internet and mobile technology is fueling the increased demand for IT professionals, McCombs said. Computer application software engineers will be the fastest growing job category over the next eight years, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, which projects a 32 percent increase in the number of computer software engineers between 2008 and 2018. The total work force is expected to grow 8 percent during the same period.
...
"I feel we're at 100 percent employment" for highly qualified software engineers in Chicago, said Zach Kaplan, chief executive at Chicago-based Inventables, an online marketplace for materials and technology. The company gets flooded with applications when it posts nontechnical jobs, but it struggles to find software engineers.
So, what about a software engineer with 17 years of experience and (soon to be) two graduate degrees? Would that be worth something to you?
Sometimes you can't make these things up:
Chicago election officials say crews will work overtime to reprogram thousands of electronic voting machines that mistakenly list a gubernatorial candidate's name as "Rich Whitey" instead of Rich Whitney.
Chicago elections board chairman Langdon Neal said 530 machines being used for early voting and an additional 4,200 destined for the Nov. 2 election will be reprogrammed and retested.
The mistake in the Green Party candidate's name appears on a review screen that allows voters to double-check their selections and not on the screen where the vote is registered. It also is not on paper ballots, Neal said.
Heavens, where does one go with this...
You'd think the parking-meter lease would get more popular over time, wouldn't you? Nope:
Twenty of the 90 kg electronic parking pay machines have been stolen throughout Chicago since Sept. 17, police department spokesman Roderick Drew said in an e-mail. It isn't known how much cash may have been taken from the stolen machines, he said.
"Area 5 Detectives have been working with LAZ Parking to address this issue. Residents who witness vandalism or suspicious behavior should call police immediately," Drew said.
Yes, so if you see someone walking down the street lugging an automated parking machine, you know what to do.
I mean, who else could have come up with such a creative way for Chicago to run out of cash right after he leaves office?
Chicago Mayor Richard Daley is scheduled to detail the city's record budget shortfall on Wednesday. He's expected to announce plans to partially fill the $655 million defecit with money from leasing the city's parking meters and Skyway.
Dick Simpson heads the political science department at the University of Illinois at Chicago. He says it makes sense to use some of the money in reserves, but a lot of the cash meant to last the city decades has been used up in a few years.
Ah, the parking meter lease. Good deal, there.
Today is the Chicago Marathon, and the weather is perfect—for watching it. The runners hope the temperature stays below 21°C, but it's creeping up.
No matter: here are the lead runners passing through Lincoln Park about an hour and a half ago:
Even more fun is when the great mass of runners stampede through, like these folks running a four-hour pace:
Let's hope it stays cool for them.
Update, 9:40 am: Defending champion Sammy Wajiru just won the men's race.
I regret my headline from Tuesday. Apparently, the man committed suicide:
The young man who died in a pipe bomb explosion Tuesday in Evanston committed suicide after a nearly lifelong fight with depression, his family said Wednesday.
"We are devastated that our beloved son, Colin Dalebroux, lost his 15-year battle with depression," the family said in a statement from their home in Madison, Wis. "We know that Colin committed suicide."
It's one thing if he had died trying to hurt other people; quite a different thing if, as is the case, he took his own life.
This caught my eye this morning only because it occurred directly across the street from where I lived during most of 2007. Parker used to chase tennis balls in the tennis courts right near the scene:
A man walking his dog this morning near an Evanston middle school discovered a decapitated body, perhaps the result of a pipe bomb explosion, and some hours later police destroyed what they suspected was an explosive device in the vicinity.
He said his dog led him to the body of a shirtless man whose head was missing and whose legs were folded behind him. A shopping bag lay nearby, and there was a strong odor of what he thought was gunpowder.
The body was near tennis courts, between a fence and a pine tree, he said.
On returning home, he said neighbors told him they had heard a loud explosion between 4 a.m. and 4:30 a.m. He said police told him they had come out earlier to investigate the sound of the explosion but were unable to find anything at that time.
Ew.