Balls, it's cold outside!

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At the obsessively metered location I call Moronica International State Park, two of the three outdoor gauges indicate that it's 15 F (-9 C). In recognition of this condition, I have decided to replicate (or, perhaps, perform for the first time ever) The Brass Monkey Experiment. I will report the results on this blog when the experiment is concluded.

Seriously, this is nothing out of the ordinary for central Illinois, and only a mere discomfort to a simple country editor raised in the lake-effect snow zone of southern Chicagoland. (Still, people around here behave as if it's not unlike the 38 parallel circa 1951; pussies!)

The death of Nelson Mandela, through no fault of his own, has pretty much displaced news coverage of this ridiculously insane storm that has been tearing up the UK and points east with tidal surges and hurricane-force winds. My blogging friend from across the deep blue sea, Marginalia, has not yet posted about this weather event, which the BBC reports to be the most extreme since January 1953 (back in my fetal days). I hope he and his friends are safe, warm, and poly-nonsaturated. I also hope that the citizens of that green and pleasant land make it clear to their doltish ruling coalition that they expect more than free-market solutions to storm damage and suffering.