I’m not one to complain much about the weather, but the prolonged snow is starting to get me down (how do people in Alaska survive?). After a deceptive warm spell, it snowed again in Chicago last night, and heavily. And now the wind is howling like a banshee, making it seem much colder.

Here are a few “selfies” and other photos taken on my walk to work:

At least these streets will be plowed quickly. Unlike weenie cities like Washington D.C., we know how to deal with snow:

I wear my moth-eaten balaclava (purchased decades ago for Himalayan treks) about once a year, but today the wind mandated that I don it:

Ominously, the newspaper box looked like a skull:

But there are compensating virtues of snow; one is the landscaped pond outside my building, frosted in white:

Sadly, there are no compensating virtues for our feline friends:

h/t: Mary

Alert reader Su called my attention to this stunning photo of my town that appeared on the site Twisted Sifter.  It was taken by Mark Hersch—with an iPhone! The details:

Taken from his window seat (with his iPhone) as he approached O’Hare, amateur photographer Mark Hersch captured this incredible photo that shows the famous Chicago skyline reflected in Lake Michigan below, just as the sun sets above. Talk about perfect timing!

And if you look really closely, you can see a second airplane in the center of the image, soaring above the clouds as well! Mark tells the Daily Mail:

“I was flying home to Chicago from a business trip recently. It was a cloudy day, late in the afternoon. We were flying eastbound, made a pass by O’Hare International Airport, then made a sweeping 180-degree left turn over Lake Michigan for our final westward approach into the airport. I looked down and through a narrow break in the clouds, I saw the shadow of the Chicago skyline projecting onto the lake. Oddly enough, I am a very frequent flyer and almost always sit in an aisle seat, but on this flight there were only window seats available.”

Can you find the other airplane? I did! (It’s harder than a nightjar.)

Sunrise yesterday, at that brief moment when the skyscrapers catch fire from the east. It was bitter cold, and looking at this photo makes me shiver, but I suppose you really can’t tell that it was cold:

Yesterday evening:

We had a corker of a storm yesterday: the sky turned black all of a sudden, sheets of rain poured down, and the wind was making an unearthly howl, like a child’s tin whistle.  Downstate there were severe tornadoes, but Ceiling Cat spared Chicago the brunt of it.

The storm cleared, allowing the Bears game to continue after a two-hour delay (the stadium was evacuated during that time).  And the birds went nuts in the wind.  Here’s the aftermath of the storm showing a flock of befuddled birds in front of an obscured skyline:

Sunrise yesterday morning (click all photos to enlarge):

Sunset over the university a few months ago (I forgot to post it):

The leaves are turning quickly, and soon the trees will be bare. Before that happens, I took a few more shots of campus:

Botany Pond, outside my building:

Fallen leaves in the pond:

Trees and stuff:

The administration building with coffee-bearing student:

Ivy/Virginia creeper/whatever on the outside of the building next door; taken from my lab

Finally, from inside my office, where a screen separates me from the real world: