The cold, my friend, is blowin' in the wind

          If you don’t live in our part of the country you still might have heard about our weather.

          The cold weather we’ve had recently (which is due to return in a day or two) is something your loyal blogger did not experience in California. The same is true for the snow we’ve had. Didn’t see much of that out west.

What cold looks like.

          We expect to have wind chill readings well below zero for the early part of this week. A few weeks ago, your loyal blogger walked the dog with a wind chill reading at a brisk 35 below zero. Not sure it will get that cold again, but anything below zero is plenty cold.

          How do you dress to walk the dog in those conditions? Here is our way: Two pairs of socks, plus snow boots. Thermals, plus two pair of sweat pants (one pair is an extra size large to fit over the other pair). Long sleeve t-shirt, a crew neck sweat shirt plus a hoodie, plus a heavy winter coat. I use a head sock and a pair of ski goggles, plus heavy gloves.

          We planned our dog’s grooming around the arrival of winter. Her fur has steadily grown, giving her a bit of protection from the cold and ice when we walk. Sometimes, if the road has been salted, she picks up pieces of sharp-edged salt in her paws and we have to stop to clean her pawns out.

          Still, even with her winter coat, we have reached the point where the dog no longer wants to go for walks. It is just too cold.

          Today, our back porch has snow drifts. The street in front has piles of snow in front yards where the streets have been plowed. The street is still covered with snow because the snow has been falling steadily for most of the last 24 hours.

          Attached here is a short video of the snow to give the reader a feel for what it looks like. There is no way to give you an idea for what it feels like.

          Driving is really fairly simple: We don’t drive anywhere when the weather is really bad. The Mustang does not come out of the garage, except to idle in the driveway every other day or so. Our other car does the winter work and we try to wash it after it has driven through salt-studded conditions.

          Technology can fail you. We were trying to drive up a hill in a parking lot two days ago and the front wheels were spinning (the car is powered by a front-wheel drive transmission) like crazy. We were making excellent progress, but the car’s traction control stopped the tire spin and that finally stopped the car. Your blogging driver had to let gravity get us rolling backwards, then turn the car and proceed back the way we came. Happily, there was no traffic.

          Generally, our city and the one next door have been very good about maintaining the roads under difficult conditions. The driving conditions were terrible that day, but that was unavoidable. You have to be careful. Many drivers here are not careful, but most drive intelligently on the snowy, icy days.

          The most slipping we’ve done has not been in the car, but rather on those memorable dog walks. The road is so slippery, your loyal blogger has sometimes had to walk through knee-high snow because the snow offered better footing than the street.

          The bottom line has proven to be that common sense gets you through difficult situations. Dress warmly, drive carefully and watch your step if you have to go out. Everybody knows that stuff, right?

 

          Thanks for reading.

Beiber needs a pace car

          Your loyal blogger is not fully sure exactly who Justin Beiber is.

          The first time his name reached the conscious level of Leeway cognition, I thought his name was Justin The Beaver and that he was a cartoon character.

 

         Well, it turns out he is a cartoon kind of guy. Only a daffy beaver would be stupid enough to do what this young man has reportedly done recently. According to published reports, Beiber has been accused of driving while under the influence of both alcohol and pot.

          Your loyal blogger is told this guy Beiber is not old enough to legally purchase alcohol. And, if he consumed pot, which is an illegal substance in most places, that’s another activity at variance with the law.

          Leave it to Beiber to make things worse. He wasn’t just trying to sneak home in his car so he could sleep off a night of stupidity. No, he reportedly zipped his car around the streets of Dade County, in Florida, at high speeds.

          The headlines of the published reports generally say Beiber is accused of drag racing and here we have a point to make: Drag racing is done on a race track. There is a starting line, a finish line and a set of safety rules.

          The National Hot Rod Association, the world’s largest sanctioning body for drag

racing, has worked for decades to make the sport a thrilling variety of family entertainment. You want fancy cars, lots of noise and high speeds? Head for your local NHRA track and have yourself a look.

          Wanna drive fast? There are plenty of run-what-you-brung drag racing meets at actual race tracks all year long around the country. It does not cost a great deal of money to get involved with the sport at that level and it is legal to do so.

          Street racing is not drag racing. Street racing is terribly dangerous and not only for the participants. Everyone in the area is in danger when there is street racing. The roads themselves are not designed for that type of use and can pitch a speeding car out of control. Anyone in the neighborhood can become an innocent victim. Public property, private property, pets and wildlife are all in serious trouble when threatened by street racing.

          Now, cards on the table, your loyal blogger loves cars. Show cars, hot rods, race cars and even high-performance grocery getters are fun to look at and listen to. They are fun to drive.

          Two pals of mine let me race their stock cars years ago, once on a dirt track and once on a paved track. Another buddy used to let me drive his racecar to the scales for the pre-race technical inspection. Cars are cool, racing is really cool and drag racing is especially cool.

          Street racing is not drag racing. It isn’t cool. It’s really just dumb.

          Thanks for reading.

 

Tallmadge Civil War Society

        

Winter in Ohio.

         For the second time in a month, Mrs. Leeway and I packed soda pop into our refrigerator in order to warm it up. The stuff normally sits in our garage from the time we bring it home from the grocery store until the supply in the fridge runs low.

Cemetery Ridge at Gettysburg.

          This week, with the temperature hovering around 15 degrees and a cooling trend in the forecast, we have brought the extra sodas inside.

          In Ohio, we call this “winter.”

South Carolina memorial, near
Horseshoe Ridge at Chickamauga.

          The weather is an important consideration for the members of the Tallmadge Civil War Society, who next meet Tuesday, Jan. 21 at the Olde Town Hall on the Tallmadge Circle. The meeting, which is open to anyone and costs nothing to attend, begins at 7:30 p.m.

          Members of the TCWS will have a difficult choice on Tuesday. They’ll have to decide whether to brave the cold and travel to the meeting in order to listen and watch as your loyal blogger speaks about photography and the Civil War, then talks about producing better images at Civil War battlefields. The presentation will include lots of old and new photographs, all displayed via a slick, new projector purchased last month.

          Rather than brave the conditions, TCWS members can instead stay home and stay warm and watch some wretched re-runs on television. Using the theory that she has already heard the dissertation (your loyal blogger practices at home a lot), Mrs. Leeway might opt to stay home and enjoy our condo’s excellent heating system.

Small flag, left by a visitor, on Little Round Top area
of Gettysburg.

          The evening promises to be exciting for yours truly, but there is no way of knowing how anyone else will react. I hope they enjoy it.

          Thanks for reading.

         

The Pima County Air and Space Museum

          Your loyal blogger visited the Pima County Air and Space Museum in Tucson, Ariz. today and enjoyed the time very much. In fact, time ran out before we saw everything.

          The exhibits include a moon rock, an SR71, a Lockheed Electra 10E (the same make and model Amelia Earhart flew into mystery), two former Air Force One planes, and others from virtually every era of military aviation.

          There are some examples below, with a few notes.

Electra 10A

 This is the same make and model that Amelia Earhart and Fred Noonan tried to fly around the world in 1937. They were lost over the Pacific. Note the direction finder (the round thing) above the windshield.

 

 The parachute dummy at right is unrelated to the plane.

F-14

    Above is a nice look at an F-14. I liked the paint job. This plane and the Electra are located in in the first hanger a visitor enters after paying to get in.

 

The A-10A Warthog.

 

The A-10 A Warthog has always interested me. Not the fastest or prettiest plane in the world, it sure gets the job done when ground troops need help. The exhibition includes a neat, close look at the guns this thing attacks with.

SR-71A Blackbird

This is an SR-71 A Blackbird. A poor image of a great plane. This plane used to be exhibited differently, as I recall. It is a bit hard, as is, to move around and get a really nice image of this plane. The hanger is crowded. On the other hand, the various Blackbird-related exhibits are really neat.






   The image below captures a unique plane, one I haven't seen in person before, the OH-6A Cayuse. The Pima museum seems to attract unusual planes and aircraft nuts will enjoy a visit. Just be sure you leave enough time to see everything.

The OH-6A Cayuse

F/A 18A Hornet

If you've seen the Blue Angels Flight Demonstration team, the best of the US Navy's best, you'll understand why this plane attracted our attention. This is the F/A 18A Hornet, one of two examples of planes wearing Blue Angels paint at Pima.









The F7F-3 Tigercat

My attention was captured by the sign, Danger-Danger Propeller, on the side. You see that on other prop planes as well, but it stands out here.










AEW.2 Shackleton

 

The Shackleton, above, was an early warning aircraft. The interesting item here is in the propellers. Look closely. Each engine had two propellers that, I believe, rotated in opposition to each other. In other words, they spun in different directions. This is a cool plane.

The F-86H Sabre.

The F-86H Sabre here is one of two Sabres on the grounds at Pima. The other is an F-86L.









If enjoy military history and if you get a chance to visit Pima, you'll probably enjoy yourself.

Thanks for reading.

THE 2014 SPEEDY AWARDS!!!

          It is award season and that means it is time for the 2014 Speedy Awards.

Your loyal blogger is too cheap to rent out a big hotel ballroom for an expensive ceremony, so the online presentation will have to do.

         

DECISION DIVISION

Grand Marshal of the Year: To the Tournament of Roses for selecting Vin Scully to be the Grand Marshal of the Tournament of Roses Parade.

Bonehead Move of the Year (Pro Football Division): The winner is the Cleveland Browns for the decision to fire head coach Rob Chudzinski. First a fire sale (players for draft choices), then a fired coach. Runnerup: The New York Jets for keeping head coach Rex Ryan.

MEDIA DIVISION

Travelogue Blog of the Year: Where’s Hillary Wandering. Read this blog sometime. The writer’s travels to Central America during the summer and fall and now to Asia continue to be well documented and wonderfully photographed.

Oh No, Not Again of the Year: The Fox Network for insisting that what the nation really wants is more coverage of the NFC East Division in general and the Dallas Cowboys in particular.

Local Newscast of the Year: To Cleveland’s Channel 8 for its newscasts at four o’clock and five o’clock. Terrific coverage of northeast Ohio.

Daily Newspaper of the Year: The Akron Beacon Journal.

Weekly Newspaper of the Year: The Tallmadge Express.

Confusing Array of Blog Subjects of the Year: Thank you. Thank you very much.

SPORTS DIVISION

Sports Story of the Year: Brazil’s problems preparing for the upcoming World Cup. Runnerup: Russia’s problems preparing for the upcoming Olympic Games.

Driver of the Year: Not sure who it was, but the winner raced on Goodyear tires, I can tell you that much.

Dumb Driver of the Year: University of South Carolina defensive lineman Jadeveon Clowney. Runnerup: Yasiel Puig of the Los Angeles Dodgers.

College Football Team of the Year: Wisconsin-Whitewater for winning the NCAA Division III championship game.

Football Play of the Year: We are not going to talk about it.

High Quality Guy of the Year: Alabama quarterback A.J. McCarron.

Big Splash of the Year: Yasiel Puig of the Los Angeles Dodgers. If he ever learns to hit the cutoff man, he could become a hero.

Wasted Space Award: The Associated Press, college basketball weekly Top 25, both for men and women. Why bother? We have a 65-team tournament. The top 25 schools will all participate.

          Hope you enjoyed this year’s Speedy Awards.

 
          Thanks for reading.

Chillin' below zero

          Your loyal blogger is on full-time dog walking duty this week. Mrs. Leeway is not well.

          Today’s noontime stroll was conducted under sunny skies with the sun’s rays glinting off the snow that fell in the pre-dawn hours. The sun caught specs in the fallen snow and it looked like little diamonds sitting in spilled sugar. Really a pretty sight.

The hound and I had a brisk walk. The ambient temperature (that’s the fancy way of saying ‘air’ temperature) was one (that’s 1) degree above zero, Fahrenheit. A stiff wind was blowing and, according to weather.com, that dropped the feels-like temperature down to twenty (that’s 20) below zero. Things got a little more rugged this evening when the ambient temp registered nine (that’s 9) below zero and the wind chill slipped to minus 35.

          Let us be honest with each other here: That just sucks.

          You look for the silver lining and there really isn’t one. There simply is no intrinsic value in freeze-drying yourself in order to walk the family pet. There is no hidden benefit, no cause for smug satisfaction.

A silver lining? Forget it. The only lining worth discussing is the lining in your overcoat. You’d better have a good one. Heck, a silver lining will do you no good anyway. It would make the overcoat too heavy and it would fail to keep you warm.

I can remember my father telling us stories about coping with Midwestern winters, the things he had to do just to go to work in the morning and get home again. We roared with laughter.

Not laughing now, lemme tell ya. No sireebob.

Just trying to stay warm.

 

Thanks for reading.

How cold is it?

       Nine ways you can tell it is cold outside:

       1. You bring cans of soda in the house from the garage. You put the soda in the refrigerator in order to warm the soda up to a drinkable temperature.

       2. You walk to the corner ice cream shop and buy ice cream. You walk home with your order in a paper bag. You put the ice cream in the freezer in order to thaw the ice cream.

       3. Your town has fewer degrees (in tonight's case, negative three) than letters in its name (five letters).

       4. You car has more inflated tires and wheels bolted on it (generally this is four each) than you have degrees outside (negative three).

       5. The Cleveland/Los Angeles/St. Louis Rams have more world championships (three) than your community has units of temperature measurement (yep, still negative three).

       6. The University of Alabama football team has more losses (two) than your home thermometer has degrees (say it with me, negative three).

       7. You have more Bachelor's degrees than you city has Fahrenheit degrees (you know this one).

       8. You have never written a book, yet you have had more books published (zero) than your town has temperature (negative numbers are smaller than zero).

      9. You get more thanks for reading here (this is it) than you have degrees outside.