For those used to Fahrenheit, 10C = 50F, which really is like Spring, and -5 = 23F.
Blame Bill!
[update] (hat tip to Rolf for the article): "The Coney Island Polar Bear Club, a winter swimming club, staged a silent protest on the beach in Brooklyn" as the temperatures hit a record breaking 72 degress. 72!
The only thing that ruined this winter imagery was the temperature, which in the middle of the afternoon in Central Park on Saturday reached a record-breaking 72 degrees. And so the make-believe winter collided with reality: People wore T-shirts as they ice-skated on the wet and sloshy rink at Rockefeller Center, and the Polar Bears turned their back on the Atlantic and headed toward the boardwalk, a protest, albeit an underdressed one, against global warming.This is reinforcing my belief that this will be the year of the environment. In Canada, the conservative Prime Minster reshuffled his cabinet to (at least) appear as if he takes the environment more seriously. I personally don't trust a politician from Alberta on the environment (kinda like trusting someone from Texas not to side with big oil), but it underscores the change in public perception of the issue. The press is still not convinced that the environment will still be a make-or-break political issue, but the Liberals here in Canada have staked their short term future on it, more or less, when they elected Dion an ex-minister of the environment to be their leader.
Louis Scarcella, 55, a former homicide detective and president of the Coney Island club, said the weather has been so mild lately that he is considering cancelling the group’s winter swimming season, which usually runs from November to April, for lack of any weather resembling winter. A club season has not been cancelled since the group was founded 104 years ago.
3 comments:
trees blooming in boston!
And Palo Alto cold at 60 degrees f -- however, year flucuations are very dangerous to the environmental movement. They encourage believers in global warming who do not understand what they are saying to claim effects that then go away the next year -- giving naysayers the opportunity to say "See -- I told you so -- you are all exaggerating and your science is wrong."
Well, when you start having a series of years as the hottest ever recorded, then it moves beyond yearly fluctuations. The zeitgeist has changed with respects to this issue. You can point out high temps and you seem reasonable, but if you point out low temps, people argue that the weather is more extreme. Its a win-win for global climate change...
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