These two things are not connected.
First, O'Hare officially hit 33.3°C (92°F) just after 4pm, breaking the previous record of 32.8°C set in 1962. I will now, reluctantly, turn on my air conditioning, as the temperature at Inner Drive Technology World HQ is now 28.9°C, the warmest reading since August 27th. Also, closing the windows seems like a good idea with some epic thunderstorms due to hit in a couple of hours.
Meanwhile, someone had a really good morning:
I didn't supervise her well enough, however, so she got a bit enthusiastic:
And I had to apologize to her for buying a peanut butter jar with a smaller diameter than her snout.
Cassie and I walked 14 km yesterday, giving her almost 3 hours of walks and 8 hours continuously outside with friends (including Butters). The walk included a stop at Jimmy's Pizza Cafe. (It's possible Cassie got a bit of pizza.)
She's now on the couch, fast asleep. I would also like to be on the couch, fast asleep, but it is a work day.
I also wish some of the people in today's stories were asleep on the couch instead of asleep at the switch:
Finally, the Economist draws attention to all the ways that my generation continues to suffer because of the two much larger generations on either side of us. The Boomers want to use up Social Security and the Millennials want all the resources for child-raising that we didn't take. It's out lot in life.
I have more coding to do now. Though I really, really want a nap.
It's 13.3°C at Inner Drive Technology World HQ right now, down from 21°C around 10:15. This graph gives you a sense of what happens when warm southwest wind gets bumped aside by a fast-moving cold front boosted by winds off the lake:
The forecast for tomorrow shows a more gradual rise and decline in temperatures, peaking around 16° between 4pm and 5pm. That bodes well for my plan to take Cassie to the dog park and myself to get a slice of Jimmy's pizza for lunch.
Chicago has microclimates. If you get within about 2 km of Lake Michigan on a hot day, you can feel it even if the wind is calm. Add a lake breeze and the cool zone can extend 10–15 km easily.
It turns out, Inner Drive Technology World Headquarters and its Netatmo weather station sit just over 2 km from the lake (it's 2,170 meters to Foster Beach). O'Hare, Chicago's official weather station, is 21.5 km from the lakefront (in Winnetka, because Geometry!).
I've seen days with stiff east winds (usually convective lake breezes) where O'Hare was 15°C warmer than my own weather station. But I haven't had any visibility into how much colder it was at the lakefront than here.
Fortunately, one of my friends just got their own Netatmo weather station, and they live only 580 meters from the lake.
After tweaking some adapter code, Weather Now now has their weather station data to go along with mine! So we'll both be able to see how much the lake influences the weather even over such short distances. At the moment, their station shows 10.4°C and mine shows 11.2°C, while O'Hare is reporting 19°C. Not surprisingly, the winds at O'Hare are out of the east—but only 10 km/h, a gentle breeze.
I'm sure I'll have other comparative reports throughout the summer, especially when I take Cassie to the dog beach.
The Chicago Park District periodically burns conservation areas throughout the city because the prairie we built the city on evolved with fire. Last fall, they burned some of the prairie-reclamation areas in Winnemac Park, close to my house:
Here's the same area yesterday, clearly benefitting from the burn:
And just because everyone loves her, here's a photo of Cassie enjoying the random pats and treats she got at Spiteful Brewing about two hours after we passed through the park:
Happy Monday.
Not a lot to post today, as the weather is nearly perfect (for April) and I need a nap.
First, let's take a moment to acknowledge that the OAFPOTUS has the lowest approval rating (39%) of any president at the 100-day mark since polls began. That's quite an accomplishment. Until now, the record for lowest approval rating after 100 days was...well, the OAFPOTUS, at 42% in April 2017.
Second, how about this day? Cassie and I covered 6 kilometers around Uptown and Edgewater, including through Lakewood-Balmoral:
This is after Butters went home, which happened about 10 minutes after she decided that laying quietly in the sun was worth getting repeatedly smacked in the face by Cassie's tail:
That's par for Butters' course. She likes sleeping, after all. And she's one of the only dogs I've met who can throw shade in her sleep:
There you are, beagle photos as promised.
Taking 90 minutes to finish a novel this afternoon doesn't seem to have lessened my fatigue from the last couple of days. And now I'm off to a "friend-raiser" for an organization I've supported in the past.
As I'm also dogsitting Butters again, there's a good possibility that I'll have cute beagle photos tomorrow. For the next few hours, though, I need to smile and shake hands. I hope the passed apps are good...
Well, mixed, really. It turns out Cassie isn't entirely healthy, though at the moment she's fine and will remain so for a few years at least without intervention. (I'll get that sorted in a couple of weeks and explain more about it this weekend.)
Also, there's all this crap:
- David Brooks argues that the OAFPOTUS's single strength—his audacity—can be turned into a weakness: "Lacking any sense of prudence, he does not understand the difference between a risk and a gamble. He does daring and incredibly self-destructive stuff — now on a global scale. A revolutionary vanguard is only as strong as its weakest links, and the Trump administration is to weak links what the Rose Bowl parade is to flower petals."
- Anne Applebaum has started a Kleptocracy Tracker on her blog, to catalog as many instances of the theft, grifting, and corruption that animates the Republican Party and this administration.
- Julia Ioffe has "notes on the Rubio re-org scandal."
- Jennifer Rubin celebrates "four undaunted individuals," including recently-resigned 60 Minutes executive producer Bill Owens and the three SDNY prosecutors who quit rather than apologize for refusing to dismiss corruption charges against New York mayor Eric Adams (I).
- Dana Milbank wishes "there were a Yiddish insult that captured the missteps we’re seeing from the White House." (One comes to mind: putz mit zvey yegen.)
- Former US Representative "George Santos" (R-NY) was sentenced to 87 months in prison and ordered to pay $374,000 in restitution following multiple fraud convictions.
- Andrew Sullivan mourns Pope Francis I, who moved the Catholic Church closer to accepting homosexuality than any previous Pope.
Finally, Illinois has 4 of the highest property-taxing jurisdictions in the US (not including New York), because "we pay over $11 billion in interest on unfunded pension obligations." We don't pay the most in property taxes though, because our property values are lower than in other places. Still, as a percentage of property values, Chicago's property taxes are second-highest in the country. I feel this every February and August.
It was warm enough last night to leave a couple of windows ajar, which lets in fresh air along with every sound in the neighborhood. Also last night, an idiot cardinal found a convenient streetlight, stepped out of the shade, and said something like, "You and me, babe, how about it?" He started his serenade a little after 4 am, according to my Garmin sleep report, and continued well into the morning. I don't remember ever wishing for a cat as much as I did around 5.
Remember this little ode? Yeah. Really feeling it today.
I then had about 5 hours of meetings with various and sundry, with a vet visit sandwiched in for Cassie's annual wellness checkup. (She's in perfect health.)
I might have more creativity tomorrow. Anyway, I hope I do.
Yesterday Cassie and I took a 9 kilometer walk through the Lincoln Square and West Ridge community areas. If she got tired, she didn't admit it, at least not until we stopped for a beer:
Otherwise, not much to report, other than I started Agency, William Gibson's sequel to his novel The Peripheral. It's really good. I'm already a third the way done and should finish in a day or two.