At Mr. Ice's Café...

... you can pour yourself a cold one on this very cold, long night. So keep the conversation flowing.

At the Lake Michigan Café...

(Enlarge.)

... you can be as sullen or sharp-edged as you like.

"Two Wisconsin men are grateful to be alive after surviving two terrifying hours on ice floes in Lake Superior as heavy waves crashed around them."

"Skip Wick, 80, of Hurley, and Mike Popko, 61, of Saxon, ... were among 50 to 75 ice anglers fishing on 1-foot-thick ice near Ashland. Wick was about 500 yards from shore when cracks suddenly appeared. He and Popko made their way shoreward as heavy swells below the ice expanded the fractures. But as they jumped from one ice chunk to another they ran out of steppingstones. They rode out the storm on separate floes while waves raged as high as 12 feet."

"Once purified, the water is then frozen, where it is aged for at least 48 hours, increasing its density and making it colder and stronger."

Gourmet ice.

Discussion at Metafilter . Example:

These are the sorts of people our society rewards. I thought about that and I shivered a bit.

ARTISAN. FUCKING. ICE.

I'm quitting America guys.

At the Frozen Lake Café...

... maybe you can catch something.

Pictures from the regatta.

From the Madison Ice Boating photoset by "Lottery Ticket":

The Capitol at midday, seen from the ice on Lake Mendota.

Meade took this shot:



Enlarge to appreciate the way the sun glints on the tips of the frozen waves.

Don't miss the regatta.

The iceboat regatta.

Best vantage point: James Madison Park... scheduled to begin at 10. Yesterday, they got started at 11 (and it was over before 1).

The main Four Lakes Ice Yacht Club page is here. And pics here. Hey, this is me.

Iceboat!

Oh, yeah! I'm ready. Helmet... goggles....



Thanks for the ride...



I loved it out there, speeding along at...



... did you say 70 miles an hour?

ADDED: Raw footage from Meade's ride:

What if you fall through the ice?

Let hypothermia expert Professor Gordon Giesbrecht show you:



More here.

The warm spell wrecked the snow for skiing...

... but it's cold again and...



... we got skates for Christmas!

What did you get for Christmas?

I got ice skates...



... and the boys are in town.

Lighthouse turned into an eerie ice sculpture of a lighthouse.

On Lake Erie.

At the First Ice Café...

... oh, it's cold...



... but we're not crusted over yet...



... share the last glow of warmth here tonight.

"Jean [Harlow] did not like to wear bras and was advised by her mother to ice her breasts to keep them firm."

"Similarly, she did not like to wear underwear because she disliked lines and she also preferred to sleep in the nude. Although these clothing practices were considered racy, especially due to her sex-symbol status, she actually approached them with a child-like freedom from confinement."

That all makes sense to me. Except the part about ice!

I ran across that by accident after searching — unsuccessfully — for the old Clairol ad with the tagline "If I have only one life, let me live it as a blonde." While it made being blonde seem awfully important, I always thought it was bizarre to remind us that we're all going to die. How much compensation for that calamity could we get out of blondeness?

Another commercial from the same era tried to encourage us to use the product (Schlitz) with: "You only go 'round once, and you've gotta grab for all the gusto you can."



Wow. They really rub it in with the sharks that ate the guys in the shipwreck. Must drink beer! I guess it takes a heavier hand to use death as leverage against guys.

Anyway, what's this post about? Freedom, commerce, death as an incentive to live, an icy brew and... for the adventurous: icy breasts!

"Why is there ice in the lobby men’s room urinals?" asks the NY Times.

In this (possibly useful) article about (relatively) cheap but (somehow) stylish hotels in New York City. I don't go — no pun intended — in the bathrooms where one finds urinals, but if I were writing that article, I would at the very least Google the phrase "ice in urinals" before leaving it in an article. I would know that some readers would Google "ice in urinals" and I wouldn't want to be embarrassed if the answer was something it would be embarrassing not to know. And once I'd done that, I'd know the answer, because "ice in urinals" gets "about 231,000 results" in Google, beginning with "Why Ice in the Urinals?" in AskMetafilter. You see this right away:

There's a discussion of this in The Straight Dope Tells All. The leading theories are:

• The melting ice acts as a slow, continuous flush
• Ice cools the air around the urinal. Cool air sinks, which serves to contain the smell
• Cold discourages drain flies
• Fun to melt, helps users aim better, compensates for poor male sanitary habits

New York Times, you seem to need a little help, so... let me Google that for you.

It's the first day of the semester...

... we call Spring...

At the Hoar House....

... the reception is frosty.

Icy sidewalks and hating to use salt.

I don't want any floor-damaging grit either. So, what's left? I found this:

When I had a wooden deck I used to scatter cracked corn after shoveling, and I used it on the sidewalks as well. The cracked corn provided plenty of traction, and if it was tracked in it wouldn't damage flooring. Besides providing much needed traction on the otherwise slippery deck, the cracked corn was also a great snack for the birds and squirrels. Nothing went to waste, and no one ever fell on my sidewalks or backyard deck.

We love corn here at Meadhouse, so I love this idea, assuming it works. And, yes, I do care.

ADDED: Or am I going to have to fight my way through swarming squirrels to get out of the house?

"I'm sending you a rainbow from the edge of my sink."

AND: Have you been half asleep, have you heard voices?

AND: Once, this was the rainbow in the kitchen:



"I've heard it too many times to ignore it. It's something that I'm supposed to be..."