5 Degrees

And -14 with the wind chill.

Really not that cold, but of course I was so bundled up walking to work here in Lower Manhattan that I made the Michelin Man look like Twiggy.

It’s Just After 5 p.m. and Already 30°

Somebody’s diggin’ the chance to wear his winter threads.

Walking the frozen Pensacola perimeter in your #MarineCorps coat makes a labradork feel like he's 150 lbs vice 120 pic.twitter.com/VTSUuSvBna

— tree hugging sister (@treehuggingsis) January 6, 2014

Not A Good Winter For German Skiers

First poor Michael Schumacher and now Angela Merkel

(CNN) — German Chancellor Angela Merkel fractured her pelvis in a skiing accident in Switzerland over the holidays, her spokesman told reporters Monday.

Merkel was cross-country skiing when the accident occurred. Spokesman Steffen Seibert did not disclose the date of the incident, but said her injuries are not thought to be serious and it is thought she will make a full recovery.

Godspeed on your recovery.

I’ve Had Any Number of Recent Transplants to Pensacola ASSURE Me ~ Most Sincerely ~ in Recent Days That It “Doesn’t Get Cold Enough to Freeze in Florida”

My first question is always, ” And HOW LONG have you lived here?”

Invariably it’s two years or less. Two of the warmer winters we’ve had. Oh, yes. They’re Panhandle winter veterans.

Welcome to a reality check, suckers.

… Wind Chill Advisory in effect from 9 PM Monday to 9 am CST
Tuesday…

The National Weather Service in Mobile has issued a Wind Chill
Advisory… which is in effect from 9 PM Monday to 9 am CST
Tuesday.

* Timing… from 9 PM Monday to 9 am Tuesday.

* Wind chills… as low as zero to 7.

…* Temperature… readings late tonight into Monday morning will drop
as low as the mid 20s well inland to around 30 close to the coast.

Readings late Monday evening into Tuesday morning will drop as low
as 11 to 15 for much of the area except for upper teens near the
immediate coast.

That’s more like it.

During the Third Quarter of the Sugar Bowl, Lovely Houndstooth Clad Alabama Debutante and Mother of Two

…utilizes surfing techniques learned at charm school in Gulf Shores to make some friends in the Oklahoma cheering section, then demonstrates how to hang-ten kick yourself out of the mean human wave you’ve created.

In her defense, they were so GLUM over on the Tide side. Just dang poopie-faced.

Hilarious description of the events and several more video mash-ups here.

That’s the Way It Is In Al Gore’s Inconvenient Two Warmer Earths

You’re either a hero…or a frozen Chinese dinner.

Chinese icebreaker faces trouble after helping in Antarctic rescue

An Australian icebreaker carrying 52 passengers who were retrieved from an icebound ship in the Antarctic was told to halt its journey home on Friday after a Chinese vessel involved in the dramatic rescue became concerned that it, too, may get stuck in the heavy sea ice.

You can’t win against a Warmerist, I’m tellin’ ya.

Agreed: Let It Die a Natural, Mercifully Quick

…“death spirally” sort of death.

Stop the bailout — now

First order of business for the returning Congress: The No Bailout for Insurance Companies Act of 2014.

Make it one line long: “Sections 1341 and 1342 of the Affordable Care Act are hereby repealed.”

End of bill. End of bailout. End of story.

Why do we need it? On Dec. 18, the chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers was asked what was the administration’s Plan B if, because of adverse selection (enrolling too few young and healthies), the insurance companies face financial difficulty.

Jason Furman wouldn’t bite. “There’s a Plan A,” he replied. Enroll the young.

But of course there’s a Plan B. It’s a government bailout.

…End result? Insolvency — before which the insurance companies will pull out of Obamacare.

Solution? A huge government bailout. It’s Obamacare’s escape hatch. And — surprise, surprise — it’s already baked into the law.

Which is why the GOP needs to act. Obamacare is a Rube Goldberg machine with hundreds of moving parts. Without viable insurance companies doing the work, it falls apart. No bailout, no Obamacare.

Such a bill would be overwhelmingly popular because Americans hate fat-cat bailouts of any kind. Why should their tax dollars be spent not only saving giant insurers but also rescuing this unworkable, unbalanced, unstable, unpopular money-pit of a health-care scheme?

One Nice Thing About Daughter Being In College…

I don’t have to clean all that Gerbil Warmening off her car

A Little Gorebal Warmering Ditty for You East Coasters

@Doc_0 The ship ran aground on a bunch of ice/That technically wasn't there/Because the Earth had WARMED too much/To recreate a Fridgedaire

— tree hugging sister (@treehuggingsis) January 2, 2014

And some appreciative handclapping from one of my favoritest peoples on Earth warmed my heart.

@treehuggingsis @Doc_0 You are both my new favorite people of 2014

— Mike B (@nightflyblog) January 2, 2014

We Heard It Was Awful, Thanks to Twitter Exploding

Having now seen THIS tweet…

I found the arrangement of the national anthem that was used for the 2014 rose bowl: pic.twitter.com/EJs9JSjROW

— Johnny Clay (@jcclay24) January 1, 2014

…I am wondering if I should subject myself to the video at all.

ths update: And here ya go, if you were lucky enough to have missed it…

Spam Of The Day

What a data of un-ambiguity and preserveness of precious knowledge on the topic
of unpredicted feelings.

Sums us up rather nicely, me thinks.