58 thoughts on “January 10, 2017: Clem-stunned”

  1. So, Dozier. I wouldn't say I'm anxious to wrap up this chapter, but I do feel for the guy. He's been on the hook long enough. Hopefully we hear something, one way or the other, soon.

  3. Oh Rock County. So school was cancelled today for the bauble because apparently no one south of Dane county bothered to read the weather reports and/or have any idea what road salt is. My drive in this morning was hilarious because there was a very obvious change in road conditions at the county line.

    1. Living with Pops half the year, my trips in to school crossed three county lines (and one state border). There was always a definite difference between the three when it came to plow drivers' care/diligence/skill.

      Our bus was not quite sauna-steamy, but very over-warm today. At first it was nice, given the freezing rain falling on us at the stop. However, I'm contemplating a second large cup of coffee, still trying to shake off the last bits of warmth-imposed drowsiness.

      3. Overhot buses often get me nauseous. Sometimes I actually have to remove my parka (which is difficult if too many people which is usually what makes it over-warm).

    2. I love that we Northern climate folks can make fun of Southern climate folks whenever they get the slightest bit of snow, but sometimes we go too far the opposite direction. School is on here today. At 9:30 there is literally 0 visibility on the highway at points, they are slick, and no bus should be out in that. My wife's school, 1 town over, delayed 2 hours which resulted in people driving in worse conditions. It is supposed to last until 6 p.m. here, give or take. Having school today was a bad decision.

        1. Not me. In Minneapolis, the only way we got school off was due to cold. Stupid snow plow army. I can still taste the misery of watching the crawler at the bottom of the morning news, waiting for it to cycle back to "M" after listing every other suburb in the immediate area even though you knew not only will you have to go to school, you'll be doing it on time as well.

          1. So much this. So many snow days that had to be enjoyed only during recess on the snow pile that was off limits.

            1. Anoka-Hennepin school district was the same way. I don't recall any true snow days, only cold days.

              1. The Halloween blizzard was on a Thursday. I'm pretty sure school was cancelled that Friday. But yeah, it was pretty much only cold that did it in Anoka.

                2. Blizzard hit Thursday, Oct 31. I remember in New Ulm, we not only got Friday off, but Monday and opened late on Tuesday!

              2. The only time we had snow days was during blizzards when blowing snow couldn't be plowed. I don't remember ever having actual cold days, even though we were supposed to when it reached 60 below wind chill, IIRC. I think we had 1 day where it was 60 below in the morning, but we still had school. Their thermometer must have been at minus 59.9 degrees.

                1. I can't find a source but I am pretty sure the governor canceled school across the state that day.

          2. I remember lying in bed and hearing the snowplow (gravel truck w/blade) from two miles off all revved up and blasting through snow drifts on the county road that passed our farm. We always had one of us kids on lookout for the bus so that we could race out to the end of the driveway at the very last minute.

      2. They initially delayed school two hours, but after the busses went out and picked some kids up, they reported that it was still dangerous. So those kids that got picked up were taken to the school and won't be able to get home until noon. Good work all around, really.

        1. Yikes. I understand why administrators have a tough time cancelling school, but indecision and half measures often seem to be worse than cancelling or not cancelling.

      3. I remember having several days off due to cold in the early months of 1996. The timing was perfect because it allowed my sister and me to spend all day working on our National History Day project. (I'm not sure that's how she would have opted to spend her day, but I was a rather, erm, driven older sister when it came to that project.)

            1. New Year's 1994. We were visiting my brother and his family in Circle Pines for Christmas, and were slated to head north for New Year's with my parents. They called to say that it was -60 deg. F and their septic system had frozen up. So we drove home to Illinois.

              9 months later, our son was born. So that's a unfortunately/fortunately story. 🙂

  4. We've had some pretty nice wind gusts here since last night, and I think we have rain/sleet in the forecast the next seven days, so not a good time for those with seasonal depression.

    1. Trey has baseball games the next three days and the forecast is for rain all three days. The joys of junior high baseball in SoCal. They play during the winter so they can use ballfields the senior high teams play on but it is during the rainiest months of the year here.

      1. I got a text a little while ago announcing today's game has been postponed. Tomorrow is supposed to be wetter than today, so it doesn't look good. Of course, it doesn't help that no one bothers to use tarps. Our Little League used to have tarps for the mound and around homeplate, but they kept getting stolen.

  7. Angry Phil might be making a consumer complaint to the AG's office later today... Philosofette calls the Dr.'s office, says "I have this specific thing, I've had it taken care of before, I need it taken care of again, please schedule an appointment with the dermatologist to have that done." They say "okay, 2 months from now you can come in." She goes in. Dr. comes in, and says, "yup, you need that done, please schedule an appointment for that." Philosofette says, "what? That's what I did." Dr. says "oh no, I didn't bring my tools for that today." Philosofette schedules 2nd appointment, an hour from our home because that's where she can get in 2 months later. We get a bill for $100 for the "consult." B. Freaking. S.

      1. I've made it through the first level of complaints. They aren't budging. Message left for manager.

      1. If I remember correctly, the blizzards of '96 or '97* BNSF borrowed the UP monster to run through their SD / MN route to clear their right-of-way.

        *One of my brothers taught in Slayton at the time, and they had 21 days without school; all the snow from earlier in the winter was piled so high on either sides of the roads that any sort of wind caused it to drift in again.

    2. Thanks for the video. It was a good distraction for my train-loving son who was getting crabby.

  9. My wife got a Keurig for Christmas. Neither one of us like coffee, but she asked for one to use for hot chocolate. I prefer tea and have started using some tea K-Cups by Stash. I ordered a box of K-Cups online with a gift card I received. So far, I've been impressed. I read online reviews of tea in a Keurig that weren't very favorable, but I have no complaints. So far, it has only been black tea, which does better with the hot temp of the Keurig than green tea, which I guess is supposed to be steeped in a little cooler water.

    Also, I was worried that it was going to be more like instant tea like you get at McDonald's, but it has not been like that. I opened a used cup up and it has the tea leaves in there inside a filter, although they are chopped up into very small pieces, presumably so that the tea will infuse a lot faster. The black teas have been stronger than I like, so I use a 16 oz. cup and use the middle size on the Keurig, then add water to fill the cup, which both weakens it to how I like and cools it down to a drinkable temp.

    Also, I've started using stevia packets for sweetener instead of sugar. One packet works better with the middle size cup.

    1. Keurigs are notorious for being hard to clean.

      My in-laws have one and I used it frequently when there. But I would never buy one. The per-cup coffee marginal cost is on the order of 5X the cost of brewing conventionally at home. I'd venture to guess that the tea and hot chocolate marginal costs are similarly high.

      That said, the machines are cool, and they make pretty decent coffee.

      1. Yeah, the nice thing is, you can just use it to make hot water faster than heating up in a microwave, so you can use the same tea as you normally would and just get the hot water from the Keurig, which is what I have been doing until the K-Cups were delivered.

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