Last month, most of us Minnesotan’s were getting pretty darn cocky about our winter weather. I can’t tell you how many times I participated in some form of the following conversation with dog walkers while out walking my own dog:

“Nice day, isn’t it?”

“Yes, it’s a GREAT day. In fact, this whole winter has been fantastic.”

“Yeah it has. We’ve gotten off pretty easy this year.”

“We sure have. By the way, that’s a cute dog. What’s his name?”

“Diggity. What’s your dog’s name?”

“Oh, this is “Fluffy.” She’s loves other dogs.”

Sometimes the conversation will go on a little longer, but I won’t bore you with such banalities. The point I wanted to make is that once in a while I’d run into a more curmudgeonly dog owner. When the conversation got to the point of “we’ve gotten off pretty easy this year,” he’d respond with something like “yeah, but we’re going to pay for it, you can be sure of that.”

Nothing like a negative Nellie or negative Nathan to ruin your positive vibe. Usually they had the kind of dogs that snarled at Diggity and were named Spike or General or Killer.

Unfortunately those stone cold dog owners were right. Our temperatures have not been above 5-degrees (F) for a week now. We’ve endured air temperatures of 17-degrees below zero and windchills of 30-below zero. The last three days haven’t gotten above zero at all and I’m ashamed to say that I didn’t ride my bike on any of them.

Today I was absolutely determined to change that trend — if for no other reason than to show my Cycle365 friends what it looks like on a really cold Minnesota day. The thing is, pictures don’t really show “COLD.” I knew I’d have to come up with alternate ways to photograph coldness. I provide the following screenshot to show I’m not just joshing you.

Heavy clothing and weather reports aside, the only other thing I could think of to demonstrate coldness was the various forms of smoke I was seeing. Every building, machine, and person seems to emit smoke in this weather. Check it out.

It’s amazing how many people warm up their cars in their driveways before getting into them. Remote start technology allows them to click a button on their key fob so they can minimize their amount of outdoor exposure. It only takes a couple of seconds to run from one’s warm house to one’s warm car. Kinda sad.

Sadder still are the people who leave their cars running while they run into stores for a little shopping. Wouldn’t it be awful to have to get into a cold car with the half-dozen fresh donuts you just purchased for $16 from the local bakery?

I’m glad I could get this ride in before it warms up to about 8-degrees today. A warming trend is coming for the rest of the week. I THANK THE POPE OF THE CHURCH OF THE GREAT OUTDOORS FOR THAT!!!!