I don't have any desire to assign blame or argue either side of an over-politicized topic. My simple mind just looks at the world out my window and reports of the extreme heat, cold, rain, or drought elsewhere in the world. Most changes in climate are only apparent well after they're established. We'll need to hold off on the final conclusions for another century or so.

 

So, I transferred schools a couple times while working on my bachelor's of science. At one school, I needed a science course so I took meteorology. Did pretty well. Got to the next school and they didn't accept the meteorology course from the last school because it didn't have a lab component. So I took it again at the new school- easy A!

Both profs both agreed that the whole global warming thing is unsubstantiated, scientifically speaking. The major argument is that our planet's temperature has been increasing since the industrial revolution. But that's just an observed correlation. Until we can compare our climate to an exact copy of Earth where industrial factors are absent, we can't say for sure that the industrial revolution sparked the global change. Weather patterns have changed, for sure, but they've been changing for millenia, with ups and downs.
There are two things that we do know, however; 1) Our weather is directly affected by solar activity and the sun goes through phases of activity. At times, there are a lot of solar flares, other times not, and our weather changes with those changes. 2) Everything with mass has a certain amount of gravitational pull. You and I have gravitational pull, but it's so minimal that we don't notice it and it doesn't have a great effect on things around us. The moon, however, does have a noticeable gravitational pull. Not enough to affect the Earth's movement in its orbit, but what it does affect is our water. Specifically, the oceans and their tides. Our moon is slowly moving away from earth and that is affecting our oceanic tides. Our tides affect our weather patterns.
I watched An Inconsistent Truth. Lots of logical fallacies there, as well as images that were designed to elicit specific responses (like a picture of smoke stacks spewing steam and backlit by red while they are talking about pollution, leading the viewer to believe that the emissions are loaded with pollutants creating the issue discussed). At one point in the movie, Al follows a chart showing two lines and draws a correlation between the two. What he failed to do was to point out that there are other factors at work that are going to affect one of the lines.

And then you need to factor in entropy and chaos, and you really get into some interesting topics...

Oops, let me get back to the topic: the bipolar weather is NUTS and I'm ready for it to swing the other way now!

 

Duane, good way to pull your foot out the half frozen mucky snow covered mud

 

It really to bad that you guys have been blessed with a little snow. Here in AZ we have a different problem. The weather is so nice that it is hard to work on the 48 when something in the garage says take me out for a drive.

 

I hate to see a fellow FTEr "suffer" so much.

 

Chuck, if I had those cars sitting in my garage, , I would never get anything done. Very, very nice!

 

Yeah, I would probably have a hard time working with that pretty little temptress beckoning me to take her for a spin, too!

 

The snow flakes that are currently falling are beating the daffodils back into the cold hard ground . YUCK

 

Can you take your truck over and look at this one and report back to us?
1953 Ford 1-Ton Truck

 

Sweet ride, yeah I would have a hard time working on the truck too.

 

If your really interested I could take a look at it sometime this week.

 

I think it is a little high priced right now. My wife would kill me too. I ve got in two trucks in the last 6 weeks I think this one would really really get her p***t

 

Hey Duane,
I'd be interested to see a comparison pic tomorrow between the pic you originally posted and what it looks like tomorrow afternoon. Here's what we're forecast:

Winter Storm Warning
Statement as of 12:25 PM CDT on April 16, 2014

...Winter Storm Warning now in effect until 1 PM CDT Thursday...
Hazardous weather...
* heavy and wet snow has moved into south central Upper Michigan early this afternoon. There is expected to be a break in the snow later today into tonight...especially east of Iron Mountain. Periods of heavy snow are then expected to return late tonight into Thursday morning before diminishing.
* Snow accumulations of 2 to 6 inches are expected through this evening. Additional snowfall amounts of 3 to 7 inches are expected late tong ht into Thursday morning. The highest total snowfall from this storm will occur over Iron County.



I've got a friend who's just north of Minneapolis and she posted a pic of the 14" they got so far. We usually get Mpls's weather, so it'll be interesting to see a before and after. I should have taken a pic earlier today, but it was cold and snowing and I didn't want to go outside!

 

That is a nice 54 F350. If it had a bed flat or express it would be worth $2700.

 

Yeah, so you want to compare how some new snow compares to some other older snow. Ooookaaaay. I'm thinking you've spent just a little too much time looking at winter. Might want to turn on every light in the house, play some Jimmy Buffett and drink some rum. Spray on some SPF30 and find a Baywatch rerun. You'll feel better soon.