At the Gate

Attempted mobile phone post: On the plane (American Flight 1825 from ORD to SFO). We are late because of a drain problem on the aircraft (a 737). The good news is that the heavy weather, which everyone is talking about, hasn’t made an appearance yet. The other good news is that I’m experiencing postmodern traveler’s Nirvana–I have a window seat with an empty middle seat next to me. That’s all for now–let’s fly.

[Update: We got out about 40 minutes late and the flight west was uneventful. The blizzard watch the National Weather Service posted Sunday has been replaced by a blizzard warning–looking for a foot or more of snow for the northern half of the state. Essential Chicago weather resource: Wrigley Field weather cam (the source of the image below).]

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Wind and Snow Report

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[Sorry–the map above is not clickable: Here are the links to the best storm-related weather sites for Chicago:
Chicago Weather Center: Detailed, newsy blog with good historical statistics from WGN (Chicago Channel 9) weather staff.
National Weather Service, Chicago: Everything you need to know.]

I’m heading back west tomorrow afternoon, American Airlines willing, and I chanced to look at the National Weather Service forecast page for the Chicago region. That big green area, which covers a good chunk of the northeastern corner of Illinois, is for a blizzard watch. If a storm moving across the Plains tracks as modeled, snow will start tomorrow afternoon, ease up a bit, then come in with a vengeance Tuesday into Wednesday. An excerpt from the NWS watch:

WINDS WILL ... RAMP UP WITH SUSTAINED WINDS TUESDAY EVENING BETWEEN
25 AND 35 MPH WITH GUSTS UP TO 40 MPH POSSIBLE. NORTHEAST WINDS
THEN CONTINUE TO STRENGTHEN TUESDAY NIGHT INTO EARLY MORNING
WEDNESDAY WITH GUSTS UP TO 45 MPH POSSIBLE. THIS...IN COMBINATION
WITH THE FALLING SNOW...MAY CREATE BLIZZARD CONDITIONS. ... COMBINED SNOW TOTALS FROM THE MONDAY AFTERNOON THROUGH WEDNESDAY
MAY EXCEED A FOOT AND A HALF ACROSS MUCH OF NORTHERN ILLINOIS AND
FAR NORTHWEST INDIANA. SNOWFALL RATES UP TO 3 INCHES PER HOUR
WILL BE PROBABLE AT THE HEIGHT OF THE STORM TUESDAY NIGHT.

One sometimes has occasion to wonder what it would be like to deal with this climate again (after the storm blows through, a pretty good cold snap if forecast, with highs in the single digits later in the week). As a kid, news like this would prompt anticipation, excitement, exhilaration–even beyond the prospect of getting a day off of school. Now, part of me would love to see the show; but I’m thinking more of snow blowing sideways and wondering how quickly the airport will become a mess once it starts coming down tomorrow afternoon.

Snow, and Snow

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I haven’t had to live through a Chicago-type winter in ages. So sights like the alley behind my sister Ann’s house on the North Side of Chicago have a certain appeal: The light on the snow, the tire tracks. Very atmospheric. Of course, I’ll be back in the warm zone in a few days. The atmosphere might be lost on those stay behind, judging by this comment from Ann: “By this point, every time I see it snow, I go, ‘Oh, Jesus.’ “

Of course, there’s snow, and then there’s snow. Below is a shot from my brother John, in Brooklyn, where they had their second foot-plus snowfall in a month yesterday. Atmospheric in a whole different way.

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Cross-Country

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The Missouri River just south of Chamberlain, South Dakota (about 150 miles west of Sioux Falls).

In some part of my mind, I pleasurably anticipate travel. But I don’t like planning for an airline trip or packing for it. I don’t enjoy dealing with the virtual and physical gauntlet air travel forces us to run. I don’t relish facing the group unhappiness that greets you at the gate and accompanies you as long as you’re in the isolated world of your flight. No, I’m not enamored of any of that.

But from the moment the plane leaves the ground to the moment it touches down, it’s hours of visual poetry (assuming of course I have the window seat I want).

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The approach to O’Hare, just west of the airport.

Off to Winter

I’m leaving the Bay Area, sunny, highs in the high 60s every day while we start to break a collective sweat about our nearly rainless January, and traveling to Chicago on Thursday for a long family-visit weekend. The weather in my hometown? Well, it may get above freezing when I’m there, with daily chances of snow. I’m not sniveling. Yet. However, I realize that my winter wardrobe is really a coastal Northern California winter wardrobe–something you might break out in the Midwest’s early fall. I guess we’ll see how it, the wardrobe, and I hold up.

Bears Down

If graciousness were in my playbook, I’d say, “Go! You Packers! Go!” and wish them well in bringing home the bacon to old Green Bay. But that’s a big if. Instead, I’ll note that the sum total of my media experience for the game was turning on CBS Radio when we got back in range (we were driving home from a weekend outing to the Mendocino coast) and hearing, “So the Packers will move on to the Super Bowl, beating the Bears 21-14.” Which only left the suspense of how well or badly the game was actually played. I come away from the game stories I’ve seen feeling like the Packers needed luck to get out of there with the game and the Bears supplied it. Not a bitter disappointment–the Bears were clearly not a great team, but they were entertaining on their better days. It would have been a great story to see the third-string quarterback bring ’em home.

Rooting Interest

I’m going to do what no Chicago sports fan should ever do—the great majority of us seem not to abide by this wisdom—and say I’m really hoping they win tomorrow. Beyond matters of vicarious athletic attainment and hometown pride, I hope they prevail for aesthetic reasons. In an anthem vs. anthem matchup, Chicago’s “Bear Down, Chicago Bears” must triumph over Green Bay’s polka-flavored, raccoon coat-evoking slop, “Go! You Packers! Go!” I submit lyrics and clips in support of my position, starting with “Bear Down”

Bear down, Chicago Bears,
make every play clear the way to victory.
Bear down, Chicago Bears,
Put up a fight with a might so fearlessly.

We’ll never forget the way you thrilled the nation
With your T formation.

Bear down, Chicago Bears,
And let them know why you’re wearing the crown.
You’re the pride and joy of Illinois,
Chicago Bears, bear down!

And here’s a representative performance of “Bear Down” :

Now, here’s the Green Bay hymn:

Hail, hail the gang’s all here to yell for you,
And keep you going in your winning ways,
Hail, hail the gang’s all here to tell you too,
That win or lose, we’ll always sing your praises Packers;
Go, you Packers, go and get ’em,
Go, you fighting fools upset ’em,
Smash their line with all your might,
A touchdown, Packers, Fight, Fight, Fight, Fight!
On, you Green and Gold, to glory,
Win this game the same old story,
Fight, you Packers,
Fight, and bring the bacon home to Old Green Bay.

And here’s a specimen rendition of the above:

Westering Twilight

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Flew back home last night, a flight that lifted off on O’Hare’s eastbound runway 9R at 6:35 p.m. CDT, circled north, then climbed into a long westering sunset and twilight. We had cloud cover most of the way, but got glimpses of the Fox River, the Rock River, and the Mississippi. More gliimpses: Iowa farms, the North Platte River, Interstate 25 north of Denver. Further west, saw Utah Lake and the cities of Provo and Orem in the dusk. Then mostly blank, dark countryside until we crested the Sierra Nevada, where the lights of the foothills and Central Valley, the Livermore Valley and the Bay Area, all shone.

My seven Chicago days went fast. My dad is prone to what I might euphemistically call confusion about some day-to-day events (a confusion that does not extend to all things, though. When we drive around Chicago, he’s generally pretty quick to answer requests for navigation help). I had told him I was leaving Thursday and reminded him of that a couple times before yesterday. I kept him abreast of my preparations to go yesterday. Still, he twice expressed surprise when I appeared with my suitcase and satchel and said I was heading out. “You are?” he said. “When are you coming back?”

“When would you like me to come back?” I asked. “Tomorrow!” he said. Soon, I hope. But today, here I sit, 1,836 air miles away.

Parking-Lot Night

A late stop into an all-night supermarket on the North Side. Inside, merchandise is scattered through the aisles ready to be stocked. A half-dozen people sit in the Starbucks cafe, which is closed, just talking or with laptops open using the wireless connection. I check out with my juice, half and half, and ice cream.

Outside, voices carry from the far end of the parking lot. A guy out there is holding a cricket bat. He tosses a white ball into the air and hits a high, high fly ball–what the non-cricket world calls a fungo–to a couple guys standing under the lights about 30 or 40 yards away. One catches the ball barehanded, and tosses it back to the batter, who takes it and whacks another high fly into the parking-lot night.

Please Eliminate

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Sign in an Evanston park. Double entendres and odd spacing aside, the message overreaches in its officious officiousness. Refraining from golf practice, keeping dogs out, taking care not to litter–these things are not enough. They must be eliminated. To aid your enjoyment.