Saturday, February 02, 2008

Groundhog

Once again, woodland mammals had no effect whatsoever on the tilt of the Earth in relation to the Sun. Imagine me slackjawed in stunned disbelief.

Winter continues. It always does.

Snow fell here over the last few days and nights. I had heard the word "blizzard" bandied about a few times in the days and hours before the actual snow arrived, but it was merely a snowstorm. The difference between the two is an important one for those of us who live in areas prone to either phenomenon.

Thursday night I bundled myself warmly and stepped outside around midnight. So I guess it was Friday morning. I was out hoping to take pictures, but mostly, I think I just wanted to soak in the bright hush a big snowfall brings to Chicago.

I walked around for maybe 15 minutes, and in that time I noticed only one lone automobile shushing by me. It was nearly as quiet out as if I did not live in a city at all. What sounds there were were absorbed nicely by the layer of snow. It was easy to feel like the only soul in the city.

It is never dark in Chicago, not even deep in the night, but a fresh snow makes the whole place glow with refracted light. It's like the light cannot escape. I absorbed as many lumens into my eyes as I could, but it had no effect that I could discern on the overall brightness.

My sluggish camera found enough light bouncing off all the new white to hold focus in the night, even if all the resultant images were heavily tinged in yellows and golds. They were nearly sepias already, so it was not a giant leap for me to finish the job myself when I processed the results.

Here are a few shots from my midnight creeping:




While it crunched satisfyingly under my boots, the snowfall was a little disappointing in terms of actual accumulation.

In the shots, the lights are all severely blown out, which I guess is technically bad photography, but I love how they turned out nonetheless.

*****

And I guess, if you are a bad blogger and stop posting regularly, Blogger will take away the stripey backdrop of your banner at the top of your page. Just another thing to be wary of, Blogwriters. Hope you guys can still enjoy the site without the friendly stripes until I can remember where that thing was in my code and fix it.

Maybe it's a punishment not for the lack of posts so much as that I think it may have been longer than six months since I posted about children or animals, in clear violation of the Blogger terms of service. I think my last post that counts was probably "Sphinx," in which I recounted my difficulties in teaching my cat to quiz me with riddles in our idle time.

The cat, of course, has nearly nothing but idle time. His schedule is clear. I left out the classifieds not long ago, in hopes that he would show some interest once more in computer programming, as he did when he was young. To show his contempt for my plan to get him to start contributing to the household, he or his sister urinated on the pages.

Does this qualify as a cat post now? Can I have my stripes back?

*****

I think this blog is open again, Blogreader. Soon enough, you might find Monday Morning Haiku (often before Tuesday afternoon) and buzzing about a fiction contest sometime in the future. Maybe even the reinstatement of the ill-fated "Ask the Moon" advice column.

But smaller steps are necessary. I feel unreasonably skittish about blogging lately, and I don't want to spook myself right back into the darkness.

In the meantime, as I find my feet again, feel free to drop me a comment, tag me with a meme.

12 comments:

Unknown said...

Hey, Creepy - you're tagged, and it's a whopper!

Nice snow, very nice snow.

Reading the Signs said...

Oh Moonio, I was just about to, but ms Minx beat me to it.

Lovely, lovely post, and listen: people who don't blog about cats and kids are not all bad, decorative stripes or no - but the Kraft cheese thing is obviously a matter of concern(don't be thinking I've forgotten).

Taffiny said...

I like the lights in the photos.

I can't help but wonder, about what it is like to be a man, to just go out walking around at midnight in the dark (or not so dark) taking photos. The presence of quiet, in a sleeping city, one's companion.

I tend to think it best, if we don't ask you any more "Ask the Moon" questions, in my mind, the pressure to solve all of our problems (and in witty funny ways) was what caused us to lose you.

And with that in mind, knowing you are feeling a bit skittish, and need to go slow, I am concerned about what I say in comments (et. cetera). I am worried that I may, while meaning to encourage you, end up contributing to spooking you instead.

In my mind I pictured the classifieds on a table, but now that I know what happens to them, I shall try to rewind and have them on the floor instead.
We often tell our cat to "Go get a job". He pretends he doesn't understand, and just keeps crying, till we feed him, and someone agrees to be his heated sofa for the day.

No snow, bit warmer here, I actually went outside.

Taffiny said...

hmmm...I imagine shorter comments would be much better.

Liz Dwyer said...

I feel myself wanting to say something like, "Wassup, Playa Playa!" but instead I'll just say I'm glad to have you back in Blog Land.

The pictures make me miss making snow angels.

Debi said...

*coooee*
waving at you, skittish one ...

Reading the Signs said...

Oh, and Moon? When you've finished with that tag that Ms Minx gave you, perhaps pass it on this way? Anything to distract me from work at hand, you know how it gets.

Gidge Uriza said...

I wanted to tag you with a 7 things to do with a spoon Meme but you'd know I'm actually just making it up.

Perhaps we should start it, see how long it takes it to get around the web and back to us?

:)

Taffiny said...

I don't know why, but that 7 things to do with a spoon idea, scares me. Maybe I just can't think of 7 reasonable things to do with a spoon? Yeah, no, I can't. Can you?

Lane Mathias said...

Sepia photos!
Very nice.

And the cats displayed just the right level of contempt for the classifieds.

The Moon Topples said...

Minx: I have at long last completed the meme. Any similarities between our jokes was coincidental.

Signs: She's fast, our Minxie one. And yes, I was hoping you'd forgotten about the foodstuff mentioned previously on these pages.

Taffiny: It was not the pressure of solving problems that drove me off. Rest assured on that count. As for what it is like to be a man, or the location of the papers when they were defiled, I shall leave these things to your imagination.

Liz: If it helps you at all, I am repeatedly referred to as "pimp" by the proprietor of my local market.

Debi: (waving back)

Signs: I have fulfilled your request for distracting memes. I hope you have fun with it.

Gidge: They never come back. Never!

Taffiny: That sounds a bit like a challenge...

Lane: You are wise. Correct in both your liking of sepia and your disdain for classifieds. I should have had him look for work online, of course.

Anonymous said...

Beautiful photography.