Click here to see the other months in 2006:
| December 1st | I'm going to stick to the date of November 19th as the day the lake froze this year, but it'll have to be with an asterisk. The asterisk will indicate that a hole opened up near the center on November 28th and froze again three days later (today). |
| December_2nd | Judging from the direction of the sunrise this morning, I'm now inclined to believe that the phenomenom described on November 30th was nothing more than a neat sundog, as my nephew Jason surmised that very day, and that the mist rising from the lake was incidental. |
| December 3rd | Laziness is nothing more than the habit of resting before you get tired. |
| December 4th |
Ice fishing houses are beginning to blossom out on some lakes. There
are several of them on Big Jay Gould, as well as on the south and center
sections of Bass Lake. Still none on LBL though. Happy 60th Stover.......and welcome to the club! |
| December 5th | YES!!!!! Click HERE. |
| December 6th | You go through life expecting Babarino, and you get Horshack every time. |
| December 7th |
A day for unpleasant surprises! The ice is 6 inches thick where the swimming raft usually is. |
| December 8th | I walked across the lake to Randy's place tonight, and it was great! The first time I did that last winter was February 5th, but I don't remember why it was so late. I know the ice was fine because I had been skiing on it since early December. |
| December 9th | The first ice-fishing house of the winter went on the lake this morning. |
| December 10th | To the best of my knowledge Ron and his son Mike got skunked AGAIN this weekend. (See the November 4th entry. It's HERE.) They both bought muzzle loaders and spent this weekend up here deer hunting again, but with the same result. |
| December 11th | Above freezing temperatures are predicted for every single day this entire week. Heck, we're not going to have a real winter this year. Sigh! |
| December 12th |
Here's a neat e-mail I just got from my friend Brian: Here is a story for ya - my dad has an Oreck vacuum cleaner that quit working. He asked me to take it in and see if they could fix it. I said sure. He said he couldn't find the receipt and wasn't sure when they bought it. A couple of hours later he calls me on the phone to tell me he found the receipt and that they had bought it in May of 1979, and he thought maybe the warranty had run out!!!!!!!!!!!! I agreed! [...] Yesterday I go to the Oreck dealer, tell him I think the switch is broken. He asks if I have a minute, to which I reply in the affirmative. He takes the handle apart, puts in a new switch and asks me to fill out a form which asks for the purchase date. I tell the truth, May 1979, ask him what I owe and he replies "the switch is under warranty." I just started laughing and left - could not believe what my ears were telling my brain!!!!!!!!!! |
| December 13th | Before the change to the Gregorian Calendar (in 1752) today was the shortest day of the year. |
| December 14th |
This time of the year at the south pole (nearly summertime)
the average high temperature is -15; the average low temperature is -20. That
seems pretty warm.....and there's not much difference between the two, but what
can one expect considering that the sun never sets this time of the year? The average high for today in Barrow, Alaska (where sun never rises this time of the year) is -5. The average low is -16. Winter is coming!!!! |
| December 15th | TBD...... |
| December 16th | A short trip to Rochester and a fine Christmas celebration with my kids and grandkids. To see the 6 Grandkids, click HERE. The 7th one (in utero) is not pictured. |
| December 17th | The lake is, of course, still solid and it's constantly snapping, cracking, booming, and echoing. I can hear it in the house if it's quiet and occasionally it seems to boom for several seconds. I wish I could record it so I could put it on here. I love it!!!!! |
| December 18th | There are 8 inches of ice on the lake this morning. With the low temperatures (well, kinda low......it was 9 degrees this morning when I got up) and very little snow, we might be making ice rather rapidly. |
| December 19th | I wrote this article for the Bass Lake Association bulletin a little over 6 years ago and I wonder how it eventually ended up in the Cook Country Herald, which I believe is printed in Grand Marais. Maybe I should be getting royalties?!?! Click HERE. (Note added much later. The article has been removed from their web-site and unfortunately I didn't keep a copy of it. Sorry.) |
| December 20th | Old-fashion is good. I've always kinda liked old-fashion. |
| The Winter Solstice |
It's the shortest day of the year and here is the amount of daylight you'll
see today: Cohasset: 8:29 St. Cloud 8:43 St. Paul: 8:48 Rochester: 8:54 Des Moines: 9:10 San Francisco: 9:34 Key West: 10:38 Happy Birthday Colleen!!! |
| December 22nd | Yesterday the lake was rumbling all morning.....more than I've ever heard before. At times it seemed like several minutes would go by without a quiet period of more than 5 or 10 seconds. I suppose it was because of the cold and the lack snow to either insulate the ice or muffle the sound. Whatever the reason, it was amazing! It's now 9 inches thick, by the way, which is still behind last year. This morning it's warmer and there's a little snow on the ice and there isn't as much rumbling. |
| December 23rd |
Dry Sherry is not an easy thing to find in this neck of the woods. In the
whole of my life (until today, that is) I've only tasted 2 brands of Dry Sherry,
one from California and one from New York.
(Of course that doesn't count my ex-girlfriend Sherry,
who was from Bloomington.) And it wasn't from the lack of trying
either, because I've looked in a lot of places.
A gift bottle of "very dry" Spanish Sherry from my Dear San Francisco Daughter, Teri, arrrived moments ago, and I immediately opened it. It's much dryer and far far better than either of the other two I've tasted. In fact.......I could do a commercial about this stuff! Somewhere I once heard that Spain made good Sherry and apparently it's true. Obviously I'm gonna have to find an internet source for this stuff. |
| Christmas Eve | Occasionally the holiday preparations this time of year get so hectic that it seems more like a NATO conference than Christmas. Even if you have tons of stuff to do today, remember......things will calm down tomorrow. But in the meantime, one should also try to be calm today. Here's a nice calming picture that Sandy Fecht (Lake Level MN Program Coordinator) sent to her volunteers. Click HERE. |
| Christmas Day | On this day in 1856 (150 years ago), San Francisco got 2 1/2 inches of snow. It has snowed a few times in San Francisco since 1856, but never on Christmas. Teri, I think you're destined to have yet another Christmas without snow. |
| Boxing Day |
We've made some significant ice in the last few days......it's now 12 1/2
inches thick (but see the December 28th entry). Just west of here on the side of highway 2, there was an eagle sitting on a road-kill deer this morning. Geez, it's amazing how big those eagles are. To see where the DNR put the lake level data I collected last summer, click HERE. You'll notice that there is no benchmark information available. There are actually 3 benchmarks on the lake and that information will eventually be added to the web-page . |
| December 27th | I wont belabor this point like I did in 2005, but I will mention it occasionally. According to the Farmers' Almanac, December, in our neck of the woods, was supposed to have below average temperatures and above average snow. Did it seem that way to you????? |
| December 28th | The ice is 11 inches thick. The day before yesterday I said it was 12 1/2 inches thick, and I can't explain the apparent discrepancy. It's possible that some of it has melted......but I sure find that difficult to believe. It's also possible that I made a mistake when I measured it the last time. Even though I find that difficult to believe as well, I suspect that's the case. At any rate, it's 11 inches thick (and I even augered two holes to be sure). |
| December 29th |
"I think, therefore I am." -- Descartes "I think I am, therefore I am......I think." -- Carlin |
| December 30th | Hey Cindy and Mike.....thanks for coming! Although the skiing was "acceptable" on the lake, I wish we would have had enough snow to get out on the trails. Let me know if you decide to try it again this winter. |
| December 31st |
4 to 6 inches of snow predicted.........we got 1 inch (maybe). Obviously the
weatherman is "business as usual". HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!!! |
