Another great one lost.

Duke Snider has passed away.

Duke Snider, the Hall of Fame center fielder for the charmed “Boys of Summer” who helped the Dodgers bring their elusive and only World Series crown to Brooklyn, died early Sunday of what his family called natural causes. He was 84.

Snider died at the Valle Vista Convalescent Hospital in Escondido, Calif., according to the National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum, which announced the death on behalf of the family.

“The Duke of Flatbush” hit .295 with 407 career home runs, played in the World Series six times and won two titles. But the eight-time All-Star was defined by much more than his stats — he was, after all, part of the love affair between the borough of Brooklyn and “Dem Bums” who lived in the local neighborhoods.

Ebbets Field was filled with stars such as Pee Wee Reese, Roy Campanella and Gil Hodges during that 1955 championship season. Yet it is Snider’s name that refrains in the ballpark favorite “Talkin’ Baseball.”

“Willie, Mickey, and the Duke,” the popular song goes.

You could get into some pretty good arguments over which was the better center fielder in New York back in the '50s. And now only Mays is left.

Nuisance Snow?

More like a PIA snow. We got 2-3 inches overnight. Not enough to use the snow thrower and too much to allow it to sit until the rains later this week causes it to melt. Soooo, I got my exercise in this morning. Shoveling. It took me two hours to get the job finished. By then, with the temperature already reaching 31 degrees under a cloudy sky, I was perspiring freely.

AccuHunch is calling for a high today of around 40 degrees with a "drenching rain" on the way overnight and throughout Monday--when it will get up to 45 degrees. Up to an inch of rain is in the forecast. Tuesday is supposed to also be in the mid 40s with lots of sunshine and Wednesday will see the 40s with clouds. Should be a whole lot of melting going on. I expect the driveway to be down to bare ground by midweek.

I'm Pooped!

It finally stopped snowing around 4 PM so I suited up and fired up the snow thrower. The snow was wet and heavy and the expanse of the parking area so large that the thrower couldn't reach the edge. That means I had to move some of the snow twice. And the second time it was packed pretty tightly. I had planned ahead, however, and had kept the area and the driveway cleared wide after previous snowfalls. As a result I didn't have to try to get the snow up and over the banks just to them. Any loss of parkable or drivable area is unimportant. I finished up at 6:30 PM--in the dark.

Terry cleaned off the deck--again--and around her Jeep while I was working so all that's left is to clean off the Tundra and do a little shovel work on the debris left behind from the show thrower. That can wait until tomorrow. Maybe.

It looks like we ended up with 8 or 9 inches of snow.

Here we go again!

More global warming fell overnight. There were six inches on the deck this morning of heavy wet snow. And then we had a little bit of rain/sleet on top of that. It seemed to stop (or at least level off on the sleet level so I went out to try the snow thrower while Terry got the deck and the small path out to the bird feeders. The thrower was doing pretty well considering the weight of the stuff it was trying to toss. Even so, the height of the mounds at the end of the driveway was too much for it. The opening will be a little narrower than it has been but the thrower can't seem to lift the plow enhanced dense crud higher than the four or five feet I've already got it at.

So, I cleared the end of the driveway and made two passes--one down and one back--from the garage, around the Tundra and down the length of the drive, when the sleet turned back to snow as the temperature dropped down a couple of degrees. I called a halt to my efforts at that point and decided to wait until after lunch to make another assault. Already we've an additional inch of snow in the hour or so since the the switch over occurred.

There have been a few trucks up the hill but they must have been gas and wind farm workers. No signs of a plow yet. That's understandable since we are--more or less--at the end of civilization. Above us there are only a couple of full time residences and I'm not sure whose responsibility it is to plow Mountain Ridge Road out to their places. I know the township crew goes to the intersection at the top of the ridge, but beyond that it's "No Winter Maintenance" to the west and, a short distance to the east, a different township and county.

After a fairly mild winter through the first of the year (the Christmas Blizzard stayed well to the east) we are certainly making up for it. Seems we had 2-3 inches of snow twice a week with incredibly low temperatures throughout January and the first week of February. Since then, after a week of thaw, the quantity of snow has increased dramatically.

AccuHunch says that after this round of snow stops sometime this afternoon, we will get another round of "nuisance" snow Saturday night. (Translation "nuisance snow" = about 2"). The good news, if you don't live on a flood plain, is that the temperatures will rise starting Sunday and all of next week will see highs in the area of 40 degrees and possibly even into the 50 degree range. The night time lows will be int he 20s. There might be some snow flurries at night but rain showers during the day. Those conditions will trigger some serious melting and possible stream and river flooding.

True students of animal behavior!

At least that's the only explaination I can come up with for this.

Three Kenyans vs 15 or so lions. These guys have got cajones! Of brass! Armed with nothing but spears and bows, the Men (and it deserves a capital "M") decide to walk right up and steal a couple of haunches of meat from a lion kill.



I like my red meat but Holy Bejeebes!

Dr. Who Fans...Sad news...

The Brigadier (Nicholas Courtney) has Died. At age 81. After nearly 40 years of protecting Earth from aliens with--and giving aid to--The Doctor. At least six (6) different incarnations of The Doctor.



There's more at the link above but also here and here.

Courtney knew he was part of something special, and never stopped enthusiastically cheerleading for Who, attending conventions and taking part in numerous Big Finish audio plays. He was rightly proud to be defined by his defining role. The time-space continuum feels a little bit smaller without him in it.

Aerie Report, February 22, 2011

Gorgeous day here at the Aerie. It started out cold, just 2.5 degrees at 8:30 AM, but warmed up as the sun moved over the ridge. The high of 33 degrees was reached under a cloudless, deep blue sky at 2:30 in the afternoon. Water dripped off the southwest facing roof all afternoon and evening even as the temperature dropped to the teens. Not much melted off the driveway, however. That's still covered by a thin layer of snow left by the thrower.

The birds were back for the free buffet now that the snow has covered the fields again. Why should they hunt the hedgerows and weed heads for seed when they can get sunflower, thistle and even suet in one convenient location. There had to be 40-50 redpolls,plus the usual crowd of chickadees, juncos, mourning doves, blue jays, hairy and downey woodpeckers, and both red-breasted and white-breasted nuthatches. A pair of cardinals also showed up early in the morning and late in the afternoon. I could have done without the two starlings, however. Yeah, they look nice in their speckled plummage, but they always seem to show up in the flue pipe to the basement stove. Every spring I've got to remove two or three of them from the firebox.

Tonight they say the temperature will drop below zero which is easy to understand as there's no cloud cover at all. There's also little or no wind. Thank goodness. If there were, we'd be seeing wind chills down around minus 12-15 degrees.

I've had the fireplace burning since this morning so it's toasty warm in the house. I'll be keeping the fire going for a few more days at least.

Tomorrow is supposed to be a beauty again. Lots of sunshine and highs into the 30s. Already the foot of snow that fell Sunday night is starting to compact. A couple more days and we'll see the fields reappear if not the lawn around the Aerie. And while the temperatures will be moderating and we'll see the high 30s and even 40s over the next 15 days, there's at least a likelihood of rain showers for a third of that time.

Yeah...

....this could be Chester.

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Oooph!

Terry and I just got done cleaning another healthy foot of "global warming" off the driveway and deck. Last evening the folks at AccuHunch kept upping the totals from 2-4, then 4-6, and up to 8-10 inches by the time we went to sleep at 10 PM--when it was j-u-s-t starting to fall.

At six AM we were awakened by our feline alarm clocks at which time Terry noticed the alarm clock was blinking indicating we had had a power outage a short time earlier. Then we got a phone call from the alarm company to inform us that we had lost AC power--the first of that sort of call we had received in a long time despite the powering flickering off and on three times for a few minutes each time about two weeks ago. Any way, we had to head down stairs and feed the cats by that time since they were howling at the door. It was then we noticed the deck held over 10 inches of snow and that it was still falling lightly.

I had no doubt that the snow thrower was going to get exercised today! And it did. The worst part about the job was all the loose gravel at the base of the snow. The thaw we had last week coupled with the salt I had spread on the ice to help it along its way resulted in the driveway still being unfrozen and loose. Still, by carefully maneuvering the chute and lifting the skids on which the front of the thrower runs, I was able to avoid chucking rocks at the truck, Jeep, house and Terry. And I only had to stop once when got one stone wedged in the impeller.

I also had to stop once to clear some frozen slush out of the chute after I had run though a large puddle of same along the side of the driveway. It surprised me that there was such a large puddle there since we had barely gotten up to 40 degrees on Sunday and came nowhere close to breaking 30 on Friday or Saturday. Even this morning it was just 15 degrees when we came downstairs. It struggled to get to 26 degrees at 1:30 this afternoon and then started dropping so that it was a mere 18 degrees at 2:30 PM when I wrapped up my work outside.

They say we'll be into the single digits tonight, the mid 20s tomorrow and then close to zero on Tuesday night with chances of flurries throughout that period before the sun makes a return late Tuesday. We'll be back into a daytime thawing mode on Wednesday that should last a few days so I'll just let Gaia take care of what's left in the driveway.

It's sad to look out over the lawn and valley below to see that all those exposed patches of grass that held out the promise of spring just a few days ago are once again under a foot of snow. But winter's back was broken last week. It won't be her forever...will it?

It's Baaaaack!

The warm weather of the previous week has ended. Last night the winds shifted so as to be coming out of the north-northwest and they are howling with sustained winds at 25-30 mph and gusts up to 50-60 mph. Sounded like a freight train throughout the night and continues through this morning. The National Weather Service has issued a high wind warning that will remain in effect until this evening. With luck, it won't have to be extended beyond the 9 PM hour.

The culprits in creating this situation are a deep low pressure system over the Canadian Maritimes and a very high pressure system west of the Great Lakes. The huge difference in the pressures of these two systems means a narrow zone of very strong winds lies between them. And that's exactly what's passing over us now.

Accompanying these winds are bands of lake effect snow coming off Lakes Ontario and Erie. Normally such bands would not extent more than a hundred miles from the lakes' shores but the high velocities of these winds are pushing the bands even further out. We had a brief snow shower early this morning and the skies remain overcast and threatening.

The temperature immediately after midnight was around 36 degrees. It has fallen steadily since then and reached 22 degrees at 10:30 AM. We should not see them rise much above 30 today.

The local state park (Hills Creek) scheduled its Winterfest this weekend. Cold and snow are one thing, but the high winds will undoubtedly going to keep attendance down. I know it has discouraged me! They planned demonstrations on harvesting ice from the lake, ice rescues, and ice fishing among other things. They also planned to install some wood duck nesting boxes for which they asked the Audubon Society for assistance. It was for this reason I had thought to go out there, but they will have to do without my help.

******

The birds--or at least some of them--have returned to the free buffet. Easier to simply grab-and-go than have to forage for their own damn food, I guess.
Chickadees, Mourning Doves, White-breasted Nuthatches, Tufted Titmice, Common Redpolls, Blue Jays, and Dark-eyed Juncoes--the usual suspects.

Yukon Quest FInals

With Hank DeBruin and his team of nine dogs crossing the finish line in Fairbanks at 22:06 local time on Friday (that would be 03:06 Saturday morning on the east coast), the Yukon Quest is officially over. DeBruin's was the thirteenth team to complete the thousand mile trek from Whitehorse, YT to Fairbanks. Their official race time: 13 days, 10 hours, and 54 minutes.

Twenty-five teams started the race, which was won by Dallas Seavey with a time of 10 days, 11 hours, 53 minutes.

A listing of the final standing for the 2011 Yukon Quest can be seen here.

This is the first year I've followed the Quest closely after several years of closely watching the Iditarod. The conditions the racers faced as they left the Yukon River at Circle City and headed up over through the passes (temperatures down to -40 and -50 degrees with howling winds, chest deep overflows on rivers that had to be swum or detoured around, etc.) were formidable. While this (and the Iditarod) are races that pit teams of man and dogs against one another, it also pits those teams against the elements. Just to go the distance and finish the race is a tribute to the ability and intestinal fortitude of the participants. That said, there is no shame to be placed upon those who were forced to withdraw due to injury or tragedy along the trail. Realizing when you've been beaten, making a strategic withdrawal so as to preserve the health and well being of yourself and your team allowing the team to come back and do battle another day is an honorable decision.

To those twenty-five teams who left Whitehorse after months and months of preparation I say well done! And to the thirteen which managed to finish the race...well, I salute you ladies, gentlemen and dogs! Congratulations!

Now, on to the Iditarod!

Could it be....

Could it be that the pugnacious prognosticator Punxsutawney Phil of Pennsylvania was correct on February 2nd when he said spring would come early this year? We've been enjoying a robust period of thaw here at the Aerie since early in the week. We've not even seen the night time lows reach below the freezing mark since last Monday night. Today we had a low of 44 degrees over night and a high of 61 this afternoon. While both of those are higher than we've experienced during the rest of the week and much higher than the valley has had, they give you an idea of how mild it's been.

I can look down the hill upon the hay fields and pastures and see that the bulk of the snow has gone. Those fields were in many instances both windswept so that they had a thinner snow cover and spread with sun absorbing cow manure. Even the Aerie's lawn is becoming more and more exposed. Everywhere there was a stone wall or where I had shoveled a path is fast becoming bare of snow and ice.

The roof of the Aerie is likewise fast becoming a snow and ice free zone. Only a small patch of snow remains on the shed roof covering the porch on the southwest side of the house and a somewhat larger patch remains where the sun never shines in the valley adjacent to the main entrance on the northeast corner. At 60 degrees, however, neither patch has long to survive sun or no sun. The ice in the driveway has all disappeared and the annual spring puddle has formed along the uphill side. (This happens because the drainage pipe under the driveway--only 6 inches in diameter--gets clogged with ice and remains that way for some time due to the insulating nature of the gravel drive covering it.)

This spring-like weather can not, alas, continue. We are, after all, only into the third week of February. Forecasters are saying there's a cold front coming that will drop the overnight lows into the teens and possibly single digits again while limiting the daytime highs to the mid thirties until at least the first of March. That should be good news for those operating a sugar bush. The Maples need those alternating warm days and cold nights to keep the sap pumping up and down the trees.

******

Dang birds! For weeks I've had flocks of redpolls, mourning doves, chickadees, and such coming to the bird feeders and staying all day. Then the Great Back Yard Bird Count is supposed to take place and...NOTHING! I've seen no more than one bird at a time out there or in the trees around the yard all day. One hairy woodpecker, one downy woodpecker, one white-breasted nuthatch, and one crow that happened to fly by while I was on the deck. That's it from 8 AM until 3 this afternoon.

Either they too can read the notices much like the turkeys, bear and deer who disappear when the hunting seasons start, or they are out exploring those open fields for weed seeds and all the undigested grain in the spread cow manure.

Yep!

("Borrowed" from somewhere. Can't remember where.)

Seems about right. I know from observation that it (Common Sense) is a true rarity. While many in the general population appear to have little or none, it seems particularly to be lacking amongst the political class in D.C. (Which is ironic since D.C. Comics gave us so many of our comic book superheroes.) State houses and city halls under the control of Democrats and/or RINOs are also CS free zones.

GBBC this weekend!

The Great Backyard Bird Count is happening this weekend. If you've any interest in birds and birding here's an opportunity to be part of a citizen-scientist event sponsored by the Cornell Lab for Ornithology.

Participation is easy. All you need do is count the birds you see in your immediate surroundings for at least 15 minutes and send the results to the folks at Cornell. You can count for a longer period of time and you can do your counting on any of the four days (Friday, Saturday, Sunday, Monday). You can limit your count to your backyard or visit other likely birding spots nearby. Just be sure you send only one checklist for each location and for each day you count. (You have until March 1 to submit your lists.)

A full listing of the rules and links to send your bird checklist are found here.

If you;re a photography buff, there's also a GBBC Photo Contest.

And here's a GBBC link to associated activities for kids.

Big Brother is Watching!

A buddy of mine in New Jersey sent me a link to this story from WETM out of Elmira-Corning area of New York.

Spooked By Spokeo

Elmira, N.Y. – Spokeo.com advertises itself as "not your grandma's phone book". Just type in anyone's name and you'll get their hobbies, their address, what their home is worth, their family tree and how about a map with an aerial view of their house?Michelle Magar of Elmira was shocked to learn she was listed on Spokeo.
She's not even listed in the phone book.

It is a bit spooky to have one company out there that's doing nothing but gathering up information about you and offering it to anyone who cares to 1) look it up 2) pay the $2.95 fee to get it all.

I checked out my name and found they had my former New Jersey address but not my PA address. Same with Theresa. My daughter, however was listed for both our former home and her present location with Grandma. My son had two addresses from when he was in U of Idaho and one in Portland.

The fact that the authorities in NY say that this appears to be legal, does not console me.

I've been trying to get my name off their list but keep getting a message about how, to avoid abuse, they are limiting the number of requests daily.

You might want to check out both the news story above and the Spokeo site www.Spokeo.com. Enter your name in the space and then see if you're among those listed. Remember to check previous places of residence as well as your current location.

Yep!

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Sunny and going up to the 40s today! (Although, currently, at a windy 28 degrees, it feels sorta chilly right now.)

We did get up to 37 yesterday, which was a pleasant surprise. I blame the lack of expected clouds and the bright, bright sun.

Yukon Quest: And the Winner Is....

Dallas Seavey checked into Fairbanks at 23:05 Tuesday night (I think that's about 3:05 EST) to become the winner of the 2011 Yukon Quest. The 24-year old Dallas is a "Rookie" in the eyes of the Quest folks, but he's been around. As a teen, he ran the Quest Jr. four times as he helped his father, Mitch (the 2004 Iditarod winner), train sled dogs, and in 2005 he became the youngest musher to run the Iditarod. Dallas' official elapsed time was 10 days, 11 hours, and 53 minutes.

A half hour or so later, Sebastian Schnuelle arrived to claim second place. An hour after that, Ken Anderson ended his run in Fairbanks. And Brent Sass should be the fourth man into Fairbanks barring any unforeseen disaster. Sass is currently about 30 miles from the finish line in the vicinity of North Pole, AK. (Brent Sass is not listed as participating in this year's Iditarod. The other three will be lining up in Anchorage on March 5th.)

Of course, having a winner does not mean the race is over! Even after Brent Sass gets to Fairbanks, there will be ten teams still out on the trail and, as Yogi might have said, it ain't over 'til it's over. (Current Standings are here.)

Aerie Weather fro Tuesday, February 15, 2011

We had a brief touch of spring-like weather Sunday into Monday but that faded late in the afternoon. Monday around noon the winds--which were roaring!--shifted to come out of the north-northwest instead of the southwest. The clouds rolled in and the temperatures started to drop. First out of the 40s then into the low 30s. (That's when the clouds spit out just a teensy bit of snow.) Then, after dark, the temperatures continued to hall into the 20s and finally the teens.

This morning we had clear skies, slightly subdued winds out of the north, and a temperature of 11 9 degrees. It won't break freezing today as the temperature will only get into the upper 20s so there'll be no melting today, but it will be sunny! The winds will shift again tonight and we'll get warmer weather the rest of the week...I hope.

Whatever the temperatures, just going to the Yukon Quest Facebook page will make me feel warmer. Reading about the -40 F and -50 F nights with howling winds, frostbite, hypothermia, and looking at spectacular photos that contain ice and snow as far as the eye can see (okay, that last part isn't much different from here) makes me feel warm all over as I sit here sipping my hot coffee next to the fireplace. And looking at the photos of the dancing Northern Lights at the Milepost 101 Check Point makes me want to be there, in Alaska and the northern Yukon and damn the cold and the dark.

Yukon Quest Update

Sunday I wrote about how Hugh Neff had what seemed like an insurmountable lead of 30 miles and nearly 6 hours over his closest competitor, Hans Gatt. As of late last night, both are out of the race.

Gatt, continuing to suffer from the soaking and unbelievable cold he experienced on American Summit, got a second drenching from some severe overflow on the trail heading into, I believe, Central. Frostbite started to affect his hands and he required assistance from musher Sebastian Schnuelle. When he scratched, Hans Gatt said he had stage two frostbite--think second degree burns--and his hands were extremely sensitive.

After Hugh Neff left Central at 4:11 AM Monday morning--more than eight (8) hours ahead of the #2 musher, Dan Kaduce (who left at 12:30 PM Monday), Neff seemed like a shoo-in for the winning spot. But that was before Eagle Summit threw its full fury at Neff and then Kaduce. First Neff found the going above tree line more than he and his team could stand, then his lead dog, Geronimo, fell in his traces.

Neff was eventually joined by Dan Kaduce, who had left his parka back at Slavens and whose team also found Eagle Summit to be too much. After being pinned down at the tree line just below Eagle Summit for hours and eventually being passed by Sebastian Schuelle, both Neff and Kaduce headed for the road and they and their teams were trucked into 101 Milepost Check Point where they are expected to scratch.

Weather and the Great White North have played havoc with this year's Yukon Quest. If/when Neff and Kaduce scratch there will be just 14 mushers and their teams of the 25 that started the race still on the trail.

Propane---delivered

When we got back from our lunch, we found we had not yet had a delivery of propane--as promised. Terry made a phone call while I spread more salt on the still icy portions of the driveway.

Terry talked to the people at the propane company and heard that they were not going to be here today. Then she went through the list of promises and phone calls we had been making. When she mentioned that I had been promised delivery today when I went to the office on Saturday and that we were now down to 10% on the tank's gauge, Terry was told that as soon as they got in touch with a driver, we would have a delivery.

And we did.

Our 500 gallon tank took 366 gallons. Doesn't sound like 10% but when the propane gets that low, you've got 1) very low pressure in the tank because 2) there's a lot of empty space.

The driver was kind enough to bring the bill to the door. He was an experienced driver who had made deliveries to our house before. He's of the old school who prefers the regularly scheduled monthly deliveries like they used to do over those made based upon degree days and previous usage. No one ever ran out of propane using regularly scheduled deliveries even if some of them may not have been large deliveries. The current method, he said, does not take into account secondary sources of heat, such as wood stoves, which are at best intermittent. Those secondary heating systems may cut propane usage for a couple of months pr a season, only to see the propane usage go way up when the homeowner stops or can't use it.

Even so, I told him, their current program is not working. My last delivery was back on November 30th. Their program should have gotten me a delivery quite some time ago. I should not have had to start calling two-and-a-half weeks ago. And when I did start calling, I should have gotten service sooner.





I've made my feelings known