Winter, that is.
Except for some small piles in shaded areas, the snow was gone.
It started out looking like this (at 4:19 PM March 14):
If you look closely (click for a big version), you can see lots of white flakes as the snow begins to fall.
The snowfall was deceptively light at first. About two-and-a-half hours later (at 6:56 PM), it only looked like this:
Tempting to think we’d get off lightly. Sometimes they predict a big storm, but it ends up amounting to little or even nothing. Spoiler: not this time.
Even just before 9:00 PM, it still hadn’t really gotten going:
But it was definitely snowing. And as always, I’m impressed by my iPhone’s camera. It handles the dark pretty well.
I took another shot just before I went to bed (just after 1:00 AM):
And now the snow is beginning to accumulate. Note how those bushes along the garage wall on the right are half-covered now.
It seems there will be shoveling work to do when I wake up.
The first photo at the top is what I saw out my bedroom window when I got up. It didn’t look as nice as that. It was still storming, so it was cloudy and very windy. I had to let the wind and snow die down before there was any point in shoveling.
(All these blue-sky photos are from today, March 16. Temperatures have been in the teens, but it’s always nicer when the Sun is shining.)
I can’t explain this, but there is something evocative about a snow-piled roof:
It’s weirdly somehow similar to the feeling of being under a warm blanket.
And is there anything more winter-y than icicles?
Look at that big shelf of ice and snow extending over the roof edge. Not good. It can lead to roof leaks. It would be smart for the association to send people around to knock that down, but they seem to prefer dealing with whatever damage occurs after the fact (which offends my engineering soul — fix the problem).
I do think my neighborhood looks awfully pretty in the snow, though:
For us, it wasn’t as bad as in other parts of the state or Wisconsin.
According to the DNR, we got just under nine inches of snow (five inches on Saturday, just under four inches on Sunday):
So, the snow level got an upwards bump (and we’re predicted to get a little bit more in a couple of days).
The low-pressure area passing by to the south pulled down a lot of cold air, so our temps have plunged:
Quite a come-down from that 60° high (or the early-month high temps in general), but this is all pretty much par for the course in Minnesnowta. It’s a consequence of living on the 45th parallel far from any moderating oceans.
The best way to approach the weather here is with the firm conviction that variety is the spice of life. (As well, perhaps, as the old adage about what doesn’t kill you making you stronger. We Scandahoovians are a hardy breed.)
§ §
This post forms something of a triptych with the beginning of winter posts And so, it begins… and And so, it’s here!
Stay shoveling, my friends! Go forth and spread beauty and light.
∇
Logos con carne 
March 17th, 2026 at 10:06 am
Happy Tuesday Wyrd
I don’t miss the cold or the snow.
We are facing extreme heat. It’s supposed to get to 95 today.
WHAT!
Stay warm, my friend.
March 17th, 2026 at 11:56 am
That’s global warming for you. My sister lives in Riverside and has been telling me all about it. She envies the snow. 😁
Have a cool day, Neela! (Alcohol is great for beating the heat. #justsaying)
March 17th, 2026 at 11:58 am
Thank you Wyrd.
Riverside gets it worse than us.
The beers are already in the fridge lol
March 17th, 2026 at 12:02 pm
Yeah, the “Inland Empire”. They lived there originally, then moved to Huntington Beach, decided they didn’t care for it, and moved back. Go figure.
Beer is good, but I was thinking tropical drinks… 🍹😎
March 19th, 2026 at 11:29 am
We had a mild cold snap here, getting down into the 30sF at night, but it’s fading quickly. It did make me have to pull the humidifier out again, which I had already drained and tucked away until next winter.
March 19th, 2026 at 6:02 pm
What conditions prompted the humidifier? For me, it’s when I start getting static shocks all the time.
Which, oddly, didn’t happen this winter. I never pulled out the humidifiers because the I never got many shocks. The humidity must have somehow been much higher than normal.
March 19th, 2026 at 6:48 pm
I start feeling it in my sinuses. When it gets dry they become swollen and feel congested. And I know anytime I need to run the heat at night it’ll become an issue. So if the low gets down to around 50F or lower, I usually break it out as a preventive measure.
March 20th, 2026 at 7:58 am
You’ve lived there all your life, right? I suppose your system is well acclimated to the usual humidity. With the nearby Gulf, do your temperatures tend to be fairly stable, or do you get large variations over a short period of time?
Have you ever read any Peter Watts? I just started a book of his short stories (Beyond the Rift). First one is a retelling of John Carpenter’s The Thing from the alien’s point of view. (Of course, the humans misunderstood the situation rather completely.) He has another book of short stories called Peter Watts is an Angry Sentient Tumor, which seems to give some flavor of his approach. Apparently popular; most of his novels have long wait times.
March 20th, 2026 at 1:38 pm
I have lived here my whole life, but the dry weather sinus thing only started manifesting in middle age. Years ago I took a trip to Denver and the dry air there had my sinuses all torn up. It only started to alleviate on the last day.
We do get variances from one day to the next, and sometimes within the same day, although I don’t know if that’s unusual. Last week was 60-30s, today is 82-54.
The only thing of Peter Watts I’ve read is Blindsight, which several people had recommended. It’s been over a decade. I recall it having lots of interesting ideas, but a slog to read. However given what I now put up with in other authors, I probably should give him another shot.
Actually that Thing take sounds familiar. Is it the alien not understanding why the local are being so hard to have communion with, or something along those lines?
March 20th, 2026 at 3:44 pm
Heh, yeah, aging is a pain. Time is a nasty thief.
By weather variances I’m thinking more yearly. Our highs and lows are pretty extreme over the year:
Yes, the alien can’t understand why humans don’t commune. It comes up with various theories trying to explain it. Ultimately, it’s shocked when it figures out humans never change, never adapt, never improve their awful design. It’s even more shocked when it finally figures out the entire body is run by the brain; the parts have no volition (no “soul”). It sees the brain as a cancer growth.
Which I think might explain the title of that other book of his short stories.
March 20th, 2026 at 3:56 pm
Ah, on climate this is us: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baton_Rouge,_Louisiana#Climate
Although the record highs were mostly set in the last few years.
Yep, I read that Thing story. IIRC it ends with the alien deciding it’s going to show the whole planet a better way despite resistance. Although I didn’t remember that Watts was the author. I’m retroactively impressed. I definitely need to give his stuff another look.
March 20th, 2026 at 6:39 pm
From that Wiki article:
Sounds pretty nice. I’m not a fan of humidity, though. Minnesota can get humid in July/August, and it’s my least favorite weather condition.
I read a few more of Watts’s short stories. I’m liking him; those stories all made me smile — they took me someplace new. I have found authors who write great short stories but less engaging novels. Maybe Blindsight or another of his novels would change my initial opinion, but so far he’s quite interesting. He can be a little dark, and he writes about things other authors might choose to leave alone.
Like a story told from the POV of a pedophile in an airplane boarding line waiting to go through a machine that will [A] inspect his mind for terrorist or violent tendencies and [B] briefly rewire his mind to make him a perfect citizen for the duration of the flight. The story is an interesting meditation of the many ways humanity tries to hack minds, from debate to advertising to trans-cranial stimulation. The blurb for the book said his stories were memorable. So far, that checks out.
March 20th, 2026 at 7:21 pm
Our winters are relatively mild, and I do like that about the region. Not a fan of the cold. But the summers can be oppresively hot, particularly with the humidity.
But of course part of the problem is my body is acclimated to the humidity. I have some cousins who moved to Arizona. For one of them, it was months before his sinuses adjusted and he stopped have nose bleeds. Although he moved there for allergy reasons that specifically got better right away.
Blindsight was definitely on the dark side. But my issue was I often had a hard time understanding what was going on in the book. He had a tendency to refer to characters with multiple tags, and one character had several personalities, which magnified the confusion. I did a post on it back in the day. That said, it might be pretty mild compared with some of the writers I’ve waded through since.
March 21st, 2026 at 9:41 am
Hopefully your summers won’t get worse in the years ahead. I don’t envy those (like our friend Tina) who live in Arizona. Phoenix has already experienced killing temperatures during summer.
2014. That seems like such ancient times now (let alone the last century). I usually wait to read reviews until after I’ve read or seen the work (which is why I only now visited your Excession post), but I’m a bit curious about Watts and his work, so I may give it a read.
March 21st, 2026 at 1:04 pm
We had a pretty brutal summer a couple of years ago, a drought throughout, where the highs got to 110. The AC ran constantly throughout the day. Last year wasn’t too bad. But most of the record highs have been from the last few years.
I try not to get into spoilers in my reviews, at least other than for the first 20-25% of the book. (It’s hard to talk about a book without at least discussing the first act.) Although I do sometimes mention later events in a very general or indirect way that I hope only entices rather than spoils.
But I can understand wanting to avoid even that much.
March 21st, 2026 at 5:26 pm
We had a small “heatwave” today. From the overnight low of 43 up to 80 today (currently 76) and probably falling to the low 40s again overnight. Had the windows open all day, which is nice after being closed all winter.
Yes, you are good about spoilers. As you imply, I’m one who tries to know as little as possible about a book or movie (hard as that can be in this information age). Just enough to know whether I’m interested.