Winter time

Talking to some of you back in Eire this past week, I hear that temperatures dropped significantly, even falling as low as -10 celsius. I don't recall such lows there in recent times but it will stand to any of you brave enough to come visit us in Chicago during the winter.

It starting snowing here again this weekend after a lull of about ten days. Its been coming down heavily creating a white blanket over the city. As seems typical at this time of year the rivers and lakeshore freeze over and the snow sits on top - its quite a sight. The local beach where we happily played volleyball and enjoyed post game beers in the beautiful sunshine this summer is now covered in snow and ice and unimagineable of such activity. A few hearty souls still run outside this time of year and you even see the occasional cross country skier in nearby Lincoln park - we finally relented a few weeks back and joined an athletic club with an indoor running track.

Living in these weather conditions has it's challenges but people here appear to be well adapted to it - the snow ploughs keep the roads reasonably clear and salted while everyone (and their dogs) wraps up well and drives to wherever they need to go.

I did spend an hour shovelling snow (a first for me) from the entrance to our apartment block and driveway yesterday only to see it covered again by some more snow about an hour later. There is some strategy involved - getting the snow cleared before it freezes that night is much easier than trying to clear it the next day. Thankfully someone else in the building did the honours again later in the evening. I now appreciate garage parking - I do not envy those people parked on our and other streets struggling to dig their cars out from feet of snow and ice each day - it can take up to and even beyond an hour to get some of them out.

I am really enjoying the variability of the weather - having four proper seasons is still very much a novelty. I am however also beginnning to appreciate why Chicagoans love their summers.