Excitement on the River

One day at work I happened to look out the window (not mine, my boss's) and saw a helicopter hovering low over the river. Come to find out, witnesses reported someone had jumped from the bridge and they were lowering in divers to find him. After about an hour (they had three sets of divers who only stayed in the water about 15 minutes - the water was literally freezing) the rescue crews gave up. (Sorry about how bad the diver picture is, it was taken through glass a dozen floors up.)

The operation was handed over to the Chicago police (I guess after an hour in the river the rescue types won't really be able to help and it then becomes a recovery operation) and for the next few days they sent men out with what looked to me like sonar equipment that they lowered into the water. Strangely, they apparently never found anyone even though several witnesses reported seeing the man jump.

How to graphically depict cold.

It's cold in Chicago right now. And it feels even colder when you look at the frozen over river. I don't remember seeing this much ice on the river. A co-worker and I were discussing whether the river would ever totally freeze over when barge went through and broke up the ice. That answered that question.

Snow in New York

I took my annual pilgrimage to New Hampshire for Christmas again this year (driving my newly purchased car a significant distance for the first time). I try to plan my route and timing to avoid the worst weather (I hate driving in snow), and usually have decent luck (but Ohio likes to snow on me when you'd least expect it.)

I stopped halfway in Erie,PA, checked the weather the next morning before setting out and learned that there would be about an inch of lake effect snow near Buffalo in the course of the day. (If you don't know, Buffalo is about halfway through New York on the New York Thruway - the fastest way to get from the Midwest to New England). Although and inch wasn't too bad on the interstate, I decided to play it safe and take the southern route (I-86 - as far away from the lake and the "lake effect snow" as possible).

The snow started out light and I figured I'd be through the worst of it soon as I traveled east. Wrong! It turned to white-out conditions with the highway completely covered - not even a track to follow. I gave up in two hours after having made it 48 miles to Jamestown, NY.

I tucked myself into a hotel to wait it out and 10 hours and 11 inches of snow later - it stopped. I now longer trust the weather-guessers!

100,000

Of course, just a month after my 10-year old Honda Civic reached 100,000 miles (a badge of honor in my family) a woman decides not to stop at a light everyone else is stopped at and totals my car (Honda's tend to fold like accordions when hit).

The good news is that it's been replaced by a newer Honda Accord, the bad news is I really don't like stopping at stop lights when people are coming up behind me. With a little luck and some diligence by other drivers I might get this one to 100,000 too.

Dead traffic lights

I walk to work in the south loop area of downtown. I have to cross one particularly busy and dangerous street which involves traffic from four directions, turns with out turn arrow lights, and traffic coming off one of Chicago's busies highways merging with street traffic (often at very high speeds). This makes for some excitement. Also adding to the fun is a fire station less than a block away, if I don't get killed first I'm sure I'm going to witness an ambulance t-boning a bus at some point (I did witness a near miss already).

There is a poor hapless traffic light pole in the middle of this mess that gets taken out on a regular basis. I've decided to document it's violent life:


At one point I thought of the island the light pole stands on as a safe haven to stand on if I didn't make it all the way across the street in one light (which if you don't time it just right will happen, it's six lanes that need to be crossed) - now I know better, the light would have no chance in saving me from an oncoming speeding vehicle.