Today may wind up being the last nice day of 2024, even though long-range forecasts suggest next week may have unseasonably warm and dry weather as well. Yesterday had nicer weather than today, with the temperature hitting 13°C under sunny skies. Yesterday was also the monthly Dog Day at Morton Arboretum in Chicago's southwest suburbs. And one of my friends has a membership.
We took the girls on the longest possible loop through the grounds, 8.7 km, in just over an hour and a half:
Sadly, we were so busy enjoying the day that we forgot to take pictures.
The next Dog Day is January 19th. Given Chicago's normal weather that time of year, we may skip it. Then again, both Kelsey and Cassie really enjoy snow.
We had our coldest morning since February 17th today, cold enough that Cassie didn't want to linger sniffing her favorite shrubberies. The temperature bottomed out at 7:45 am, hitting -8.6°C at IDTWHQ, a cold we haven't experienced since 8:25 am on February 17th. O'Hare hit -10°C at 8 am, also the first time since 8 am February 17th. Tonight, going into the first day of astronomical winter, the forecast predicts it'll get even colder before warming up a bit on Monday.
Unrelated to the weather are these two things I liked from the past week. Yesterday I went over to a friend's house to help her set up a new computer and back up her old one. It turned out she was fostering this little guy, Hayes:
She texted me last night to say thanks and also that she's going to fork over the $495 adoption fee for him. Because of course she will. He's a sweet Lab-something mix whose pregnant mom got rescued from the side of the road in Arkansas. He'll have a much better (and longer) life with my friend than he would have otherwise.
I also liked the way the sun played around with the Civic Opera Building and 110 North Wacker (the mirrored building behind the Civic Opera) on Tuesday afternoon:
My new office is farther west than my old one, but still facing north, so it won't get any direct sunlight, ever. That said, on Tuesday I discovered that the mirrored windows at 110 North Wacker will give me pretty intense reflected sunlight, which is almost as bright. I'm still only going in once a week, but it's a nice perk.
I'm dog-sitting this weekend, so this is the first thing I saw when I opened my eyes just before 7am:
Telling Butters to go away had the opposite effect of what I'd intended:
Believe it or not, this pathetic look came after I fed them both:
They're now asleep on the couch together. At some point today, they're getting an hour-long walk—which won't actually go that far, because beagles are scent hounds. Every blade of grass must be sniffed.
I just finished a 75-minute open-level French test as part of a QA study that Duolingo invited me to participate in. What an eye-opener. And quelle épuisement!
The test started well enough but got a lot harder as it went on, for two principal reasons. First, the order of sections went precisely in the order of my abilities: reading, writing, listening, speaking. Turns out I read French a lot better than I write it, write it better than I understand it, and speak it like a reject from a Pink Panther film. Some poor evaluator will have to listen to me going on for nearly three minutes about how hard the job of cat-herder is. What's worse, I only just now learned the word berger. "Herder des chats" is, apparently, not a thing, but berger de chats potentially is. I hope whoever scores that response at least has a sense of humor.
The second reason it got harder is that "open level" bit I mentioned. Each section got progressively more difficult, such that by the end of the listening part I could barely pick out the topic let alone individual words. Senegalese fishermen, you may be surprised to learn, are harder to understand than recorded announcements at train stations.
Still, I'm glad I did it. I don't know if they'll share the results with me, because they only want the data to calibrate their language-learning product. I hope they do, particularly before I pop out of the Chunnel just over two weeks from now.
I'm dog-sitting again, so a nervous beagle wandered up to my office during the test to see why I hadn't fed her yet. I suppose they both could use an around-the-block and some kibble. I will try to speak French to them, if only for my own practice.
Oh, and if you haven't been able to get to Weather Now this afternoon, that's because I shut it down for a bit while I root out a connection-exhaustion problem. I believe there are too many bots hitting it the last few days, but it still shouldn't crash when they do. Until I can fix the problem, or get rid of the bots, I'm only going to have it up a little bit at a time. (Its data collection continues unaffected, however.)
The forecast still predicts today will be the hottest day of the year. Last night at IDTWHQ the temperature got all the way down to 26.2°C right before sunrise. We have a heat advisory until 10pm, by which time the thunderstorms should have arrived. Good thing Cassie and I got a bit of extra time on our walk to day camp this morning.
Elsewhere in the world:
Finally, Garmin has released its latest fitness watch that doubles as a freaking Dick Tracy wrist phone. I mean, first, how cool is that? And second, how come it took 90 years after Dick Tracy got one?
Funny thing about visiting the West Coast: staying awake past 10pm is not fun, and I wake up at 5am. Plus, Hazel decided that I was her person last night, so at various points of the night I had a 20-kilo pittie in the crook of my knees or pushing me off the bed. (Note to Cassie: this is why you sleep on the couch.)
We have typical Seattle weather today, so we'll be dodging raindrops, and possible making a Brews & Choos visit. Updates as conditions warrant.
I mentioned that the weather today is amazing, but yesterday's was also pretty good (if a bit humid). Cassie and I walked about 18 km throughout the day and spent most of the rest of the day outside.
But Cassie's day started pretty well even before we set out:
Sadly, neither of us could get to the last little bit of peanut butter at the bottom of the jar. (I labeled it "dog" because no one wants to get her peanut butter confused with the jar for people.)
We trundled off to the Horner Park DFA early in the afternoon:
And met her friend Butters, who decided to dig a hole next to a bench and settle into it:
(Apparently Butters does this often.)
We also had a slice at Jimmy's Pizza and some QT at Spiteful Brewing, finally getting home to some real couch time around 8.
Finally, I want to show some puzzling user experience design. I changed my phone to French because I'm visiting Provence next month and I need the practice. I'm also using Duolingo to build my skills, and in fact just started CEFR level B1 today.
Most of my apps immediately started displaying French messages, and Garmin even started sending me emails in French. One app didn't seem to get the memo, though. See if you can guess which.
Bien fait, Duolingo!
The hot, humid weather we've had for the past couple of weeks has finally broken. I'm in the Loop today, and spent a good 20 minutes outside reading, and would have stayed longer, except I got a little chilly. I dressed today more for the 24°C at home and less for the cooler, breezier air this close to the lake.
Elsewhere in the world:
- I was waiting for Russia expert Julia Ioffe to weigh in on last week's hostage release.
- The Chicago White Sox failed to set the all-time record for most consecutive losses in the American League yesterday by winning their first game in the last 23.
- Of the $1.2 trillion Carbon Reduction Program funds allocated to reduce fossil-fuel emissions, $130 billion has been spent so far: but only $26 billion on rail, and $70 billion on highways.
- Even though Deutsche Bahn has faster, timelier, more convenient, more comfortable, and just more trains than the US, Germans say their national railroad is on the wrong track.
- Deadhorse, Alaska, which lies at 70° north latitude, set an all-time record yesterday with a high temperature just below 32°C.
- After CrowdStrike told Delta Airlines to go pound sand a couple days ago, Microsoft told the carrier off yesterday.
- Be careful taking dogs to fresh-water swimming holes: warmer weather has made blue-green algae blooms more common.
Finally, today is the 60th anniversary of the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution. If you don't know what that is, read up. It's probably the most direct cause of most of our military policy since then.
Cassie and I spent all day outside yesterday, and today we're both pooped. We spent about 30 minutes at the dog beach before getting lunch at the Dock, the outdoor restaurant at Montrose Beach. Did Cassie enjoy the dog beach? Oh, yes she did:
From the Dock we walked 5.1 km along the lake to the new Duke of Perth:
From there, we headed home, but wouldn't you know we got distracted by the beer garden at Begyle Brewing?
By this point we'd walked over 3 hours and covered 15½ kilometers, so Cassie took a well-deserved nap:
Altogether, we walked 17.9 km (11.2 miles for the 19th-century crowd) over 3½ hours. Today we're taking it a bit easier. But Cassie was excited to take her morning walk at 7 am, so she clearly has Weimaraner-grade energy reserves.
Cassie found a comfortable position on the couch while I was making lunch yesterday.
