The Daily Parker

Politics, Weather, Photography, and the Dog

Quick jog through the park

Today is the Chicago Marathon, and the weather is perfect—for watching it. The runners hope the temperature stays below 21°C, but it's creeping up.

No matter: here are the lead runners passing through Lincoln Park about an hour and a half ago:

Even more fun is when the great mass of runners stampede through, like these folks running a four-hour pace:

Let's hope it stays cool for them.

Update, 9:40 am: Defending champion Sammy Wajiru just won the men's race.

Enough already

The Chicago Tribune's Tim Skilling asks, "Sick of the Heat"? YES, dammit:

A heat advisory continues for most of the Chicagoland area today along with an excessive heat warning for Cook County. This is the second straight day with highs in the 90s and tomorrow should extend that steamy streak to three days. The combination of heat and humidity will make it feel like 98 to 105 degrees today.

This level of heat can be dangerous, so when can you tell if the heat is making you sick?

He goes on to discuss heat cramps, heat exhaustion, and heatstroke. But even absent those problems, the heat is definitely making me sick. Chicago has had 18 days in a row over 32°C; I haven't had my windows open all month; and today we set a new weather record, 43 consecutive days over 27°C.

It's much worse in Europe:

Russia’s record heat wave may already have taken 15,000 lives and cost the economy $15 billion as fires and drought ravage the country.

At least 7,000 people have probably died in Moscow as a result of the heat, and the nationwide death toll is likely to be at least twice that figure, according to Jeff Masters, co- founder of Weather Underground, a 15-year-old Internet weather service that gathers information from around the world.

Good thing this is just a fluke, and has nothing to do with anthropogenic climate change, which is a myth concocted by a conspiracy of liberal kabals.

Author's Note

Usually G#, but today C# or possibly even Db.[1,2]

I've had a raspy voice and a strange ability to hit bass notes the last few days, and the weather is why:

The heat and plentiful rain of recent weeks has led to a bumper crop of mold spores--and never more so than on Friday. Loyola Gottlieb Hospital's mold count, produced by Dr. Joseph Leija and his staff, surged to a five-year high--and nearly to "alert" levels Friday. The count was 49,789 spores per cubic meter--alerts are issued when the mold counts reach 50,000.

A mammoth plume of wildfire smoke, extending thousands of miles from Canada's arctic circle south into the Midwest and east to Pennsylvania, remained draped across the Chicago area, lending skies here a hazy appearance and producing yet another evening of eye-catching sunsets Friday night.

Somke, mold, heat, humidity: fun times in Chicago. (Have I mentioned how much I'm looking forward to October?)

[1] Apologies to Prof. Peter Schickele at the University of Southern North Dakota at Hoople.

[2] Historically, in most musical temperaments, the note C# is actually sharp of Db. The proof is very long and I'm lazy.

Chicago sunrise chart, 2010-2011

It's time for the semi-annual update of the Chicago sunrise chart. (You can get one for your own location at http://www.wx-now.com/Sunrise/SunriseChart.aspx.) I'm a little late with the mid-year update because I've been a little busy. You haven't missed much—and anyway, they overlap.

An interesting note about 2010: the sunset on November 6th will be the latest sunrise in Chicago (7:30am) until 2021—and that, only within 4 seconds of precision.

Date Significance Sunrise Sunset Daylight
2010
2 Jul 8:30pm sunset 05:20 20:30 15:10
17 Jul 5:30am sunrise 05:30 20:23 14:52
9 Aug 8pm sunset 05:53 20:00 14:06
16 Aug 6am sunrise 06:00 19:50 13:49
29 Aug 7:30pm sunset 06:14 19:29 13:16
14 Sep 6:30am sunrise 06:30 19:02 12:31
15 Sep 7pm sunset 06:31 19:00 12:29
22 Sep Equinox, 22:09 CDT 06:38 18:48 12:10
25 Sep 12-hour day 06:41 18:43 12:00
3 Oct 6:30pm sunset 06:50 18:29 11:39
12 Oct 7am sunrise 07:00 18:14 11:14
21 Oct 6pm sunset 07:10 18:00 10:50
6 Nov Latest sunrise until 6 Nov 2021
Latest sunset until Feb 28th
07:30 17:39 10:09
7 Nov Standard time returns
Earliest sunrise until Mar 3rd
06:31 16:38 10:07
15 Nov 4:30pm sunset 06:40 16:30 9:49
2 Dec 7am sunrise 07:00 16:20 9:20
8 Dec Earliest sunset of the year 07:06 16:20 9:14
21 Dec Solstice, 17:38 CST 07:15 16:23 9:08
2011
3 Jan Latest sunrise until Oct. 29th 07:19 16:32 9:13
27 Jan 5pm sunset 07:08 17:00 9:51
5 Feb 7am sunrise 07:00 17:11 10:11
20 Feb 5:30pm sunset 06:40 17:30 10:50
27 Feb 6:30am sunrise 06:29 17:39 11:09
12 Mar Earliest sunrise until Apr. 17th
Earliest sunset until Oct. 26th
06:08 17:54 11:45
13 Mar Daylight savings time begins
Latest sunrise until Oct. 19th
Earliest sunset until Sept. 19th
07:07 18:55 11:48
17 Mar 7am sunrise, 7pm sunset
12-hour day
07:00 19:00 12:00
20 Mar Equinox 18:21 CDT 06:55 19:03 12:08
4 Apr 6:30am sunrise (again) 06:29 19:20 12:50
13 Apr 7:30pm sunset 06:14 19:30 13:15
22 Apr 6am sunrise 06:00 19:40 13:39
11 May 8pm sunset 05:35 20:00 14:25
16 May 5:30am sunrise 05:30 20:05 14:35
15 Jun Earliest sunrise of the year 05:15 20:28 15:13
21 Jun Solstice 12:16 CDT
8:30pm sunset
05:16 20:30 15:14
27 Jun Latest sunset of the year 05:18 20:31 15:13

You can get sunrise information for your location at wx-now.com.

She also has a penetrating wit

A friend drove through the squall line that hit the East Coast yesterday and got extremely lucky, when you think about it:

She's fine, and so is her car, though she had to have the windshield replaced in the dark because of the widespread power outages out there.

Then there's the heat. Cities all up and down the East Coast hit record high temperatures over the weekend, including 38°C in Raleigh, 41°C in Richmond, and 37°C in Washington.

Monsoon season

Chicago got a bit of rain yesterday, after what seemed like a few weeks of drought:

Emergency personnel from Chicago and several suburbs headed to Westchester this morning after flooding caused by heavy overnight rainstorms forced the evacuation of a nursing home in the west suburb.

Overnight weather left many people and vehicles stranded on roadways as thunderstorms hit north central and northeast Illinois with intense lightning and winds up to 80 km/h. A flash flood warning [was] in effect until 7 p.m.

And it's not over:

Thunderstorms were on the decline by mid-morning, but as the day heats up and the front pushes into the state, thunderstorms should develop again by early afternoon. The National Storm Prediction Center has northeast and central Illinois and much of Indiana in the outlook area for potential severe storms.

With the front approaching from the west mid-afternoon, from that point on, it appears the biggest threat of severe storms in the Chicago area is south, then northwest Indiana late afternoon and evening.

Overnight it got down all the way to 21°C, briefly. Someday soon it'll get all the way up to 21°C, and I'll be happier.

Roll on, October

Chicago is having a one-day respite from the longest streak of 32°C weather in four years:

Powerful thunderstorms bypassed Chicago Monday -- and so did 90-degree heat. It marked the first time in six days the mercury failed to reach 90 degrees here and ended the area's longest string of consecutive 90-degree days in four years. Not since July 28 through Aug. 2, 2006 had the Chicago area logged more 90-degree temperatures than in the five days leading up to Monday.

Incredibly, July 2010, with an average temperature of 25.6°C degrees on the books to date, is running 5.6°C warmer than the same period a year ago and nearly 2.8°C above the long-term average. Using temperature data as a guide, it appears air conditioner use for the month may be outpacing last year's usage by a whopping three and a half times!

The twelve 90-degree temperatures on the books this year is four times as many as had occurred by this time a year ago.

The more seasonable brand of warmth is to continue its dominance in the area Tuesday and Wednesday. Both days are likely to see highs in the mid 80s over the vast majority of the Chicago area. But a new round of 90-degree heat -- including the possibility of 2010's hottest temperature to date -- is in sight.

My air conditioners struggle to keep the temperature below 27°C. I am not happy. Parker has decided that sleeping on the hardwood floor directly under one of them is preferable to sleeping on his comfy bed. I'm beginning to agree.

St Petersburg Residency, Day 4

I didn't come to Russia for the food.

This is fortunate. The lunch buffet yesterday had pork filets, penne with cream sauce, white rice, salmon roulades, roasted carrots with butter. Then the dinner buffet had pork roulades, spaghetti with cream sauce, black and white rice, salmon filets, roasted carrots with butter. Same Sunday, same Saturday, though there was a minor stir when we found out the Halal meal was lamb chops, which the Muslim students eagerly devoured leaving none for the rest of us.

A Ukrainian friend asked, "This does not sound like traditional Russian food to me. What hotel are you based in?" Ah, here's where the story takes a particularly grim turn: we're in the British-owned Corinthia Nevskij Palace. British-owned. Which is odd, because our food in London was actually pretty good, especially breakfast.

Russia does, however, have tasty things to drink. But we'll leave that aside for now.

And another thing, which is keeping me in the building for the time being: It's bloody 30°C outside. Yecch. I'm hoping it cools off a bit before I head out for more photography and meeting up with my team to watch the Dutch beat Uruguay.