I think what makes it worse for me is last December was pretty mild. It was an unbelievable 65F on Christmas eve; I went on a 100 mile ride and saw lots of Harleys out in the sun! Amazing.

This year we're getting hammered by lake-effect weather. It's brutal.

My TT250 is due to arrive next week, too...

It's why I live up north. We don't get the perfect So Cal weather year round but I do like the 4 seasons.....and it's loaded with friendly hillbillies.

This meme about sums it up!!

And it was uphill both ways!

Up hill both ways and don't forget the two pairs of socks and bread bags inside of your shoes. :hehe:

I watched this now I really want to ride:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f9jqfbZj0Ts

My cold wx contribution to this thread

http://www.chinariders.net/showthrea...183#post238183

I'm just happy for the wet and cold (a rare commodity in sotex) we need it to keep the pastures alive and to kill the Zika mosquitos.

http://www.cidrap.umn.edu/news-persp...ase-local-zika

I have never been so happy to see 40F forecast. It got down to 6F yesterday, with added windchill.
http://i.imgur.com/87GlzKq.png

Fun 500 mile drive back home yesterday. Whiteouts here and there in WI, but nothing I haven't dealt with in the past. Roads south of Madison, WI were pretty bad. It's usually ninety minutes either way but took three hours yesterday.

The weather is all relative, though. I was gassing up company Fusion somewhere around the Dells and it was snowing pretty hard. I was wearing a winter cap and a sweater. The woman gassing up on the other side of the pump was bundled up beyond belief. She asked if I was cold and I said not really. She was from the Gulf Coast, and freezing.

It's dropped as the sun has started to rise. Rained most of the week. Roads froze overnight. No riding today. :-(

It's funny what we adapt to. I was hiking on our local 1,400 foot hill, Badger Mountain, yesterday. Zero degrees, overcast, calm winds. I felt great!

I ran into a guy at the top who said he was not used to the weather here as he recently moved. He was from Chicago and marvelled at how this winter, our coldest so far in 50 years, felt so mild to him!

Badger Mountain

I see you are also a thrifty Chinarider when it comes to thermostat settings! I also keep mine in the 63-65 degree range LOL!

That's one of the frustrations I have. I'm quite happy (well, maybe not happy :D ) to ride in 20-25F, as it tends to be extremely dry, but the weather patterns here often have long cycles of dry, freezing nights followed by precipitation in the day, so it renders the roads hazardous for riders.

This last week, it's only warmed up to either rain or snow :-(

Maybe he doesn't have a furnace, only AC. :hehe:

LOL! Nah.... I set it down to 63' overnight and let the wood stove burn out. Instead of burning propane with the HVAC, the pellet stove self-fires about 6 am. It was toasty shortly thereafter!

Who can sleep with the heater raging, thats what a heater blankets for. Heat dries me out

Can you burn corn in that pellet heater. I think that would be neat for folks with abundance of dried corn.

Isn't that called popcorn?

I don't think I can do that the way mine's set up. I'd probably have to reset the pots on the main board to accommodate. It only costs me about 350-400.00 in pellets between October 1st and April so that's pretty cheap heat. The programmable stat makes all the difference. We have it off when we aren't home and have it fire a half hour before we arrive after work. If it's DAMN COLD, I'll fire the HVAC for a half hour to warm the house fast and help the pellet stove reclaim. It's all in the plan............. I'm cheap.

My hitching rail was not a happy camper this weekend.

We have been in the 40's and 50's, but major wind=major sand blowing all over. You literally crunch sand in your teeth! Plus, the ride home is usually in a headwind, with sidewinds, and wind from all over (except of course my back!!) blowing me all over the road on my scooter. Winter has sucked here in the desert--maybe it will keep the snowbirds away :tup: ??

A mountain pass in nearby Oregon. It is opened just to bicycles for two weeks every Spring. It's a lot of fun and a 4,000 foot climb.

Now if it would only smoke that chicken

https://www.walmart.com/ip/Traeger-P...&wl13=&veh=sem

Saw this yesterday for $499 plus tax...tempted, but not so much. Knock off a hondo and now we're talkin.

Are you some kind of electronics guru? I could go out the garage, grab my soldering iron and replace those Potentiometers in the main board is all I heard. :D

Fewer Canadian snowbirds this year because of the exchange rate. Weather has been pretty nice 75 miles north in Quartzsite. 54 degrees and calm wind right now at 5 am.

Looks like highway 242 near Sisters. Great motorcycle road that I ride several times per year.

LOL! Nah....but I did spend 20 years in "business machine". Mainly, if you've ever had experience with the real old pellet stoves, they were so finicky, you had to reset the pots on the main board just for switching brands of pellets! Between the old stoves attitude and the quality control of the old pellets, you did the best you could to stick with the same brand.

Pellet stoves are very cool. If you understand internal combustion and how an engine works, anyone can work on one.

You got it!!! Also great on a motorcycle!

It started with freezing ran today at about 11AM and now visibility is down to less that two blocks where I live. They closed the gates on I-94 and Highway 83. It's a good thing that I decided not to leave town after the blizzard warning for several days. Right now I'm worried about power lines breaking and having to put the food and beverages outside, if I can get the door open...

Remind me not to complain about out weather any time soon.

That is 3 hours later. I raised the flash so you can see the snow that falling from the right to left or from the north if you prefer because of the wind.

Ouch. Where we were with the previous weekends' weather. Hunker down.

Now to add insult to injury. I woke up this morning and our snow is nearly gone. It is supposed to hit 51F so I will be out on the Ural this afternoon.

We have freezing rain and going up to the low 40's .

Hertz...thanks for the update. I was thinking about you while watching the weathermap. The only thing that can be said is thank God for the weather machine and all the good that comes from it that is our beautiful and bountiful country.

Iraq
https://encrypted-tbn0.gstatic.com/i...XoURaSTyb3LCig

Thanks for the extra perspective black bike. I would imagine that any place in this free country of ours (or Canada of course) on its worst day is better than Iraq on its best today. Thank God for our freedom.

We had some fun Christmas day activities ourselves. Verla and I got to spend some time together, and Monte and I flew to Leavenworth Washington to take in the Christmas decorations. All in all, a beautiful day.

Sorry that I don't have a cool car in the driveway. The guy from down the street with a huge snow blower helped to clean the driveway tonight and we still needed shovels.:doh: Only one lane is open on the through street in front of my house We only got about 12 inches of snow this time but the drifts with the crazy wind...

So far we have dodged big snow... But it is coming.we will eventually get hammered.

I was thinking about putting a Monster Truck 4x4 RC Track sign in the front yard but with the way things are in the US right now I decided not to...

It's been dang cold here (20's) but at 3000', we've been lucky enough not to have the snow, so far. It's only about 10 minutes up the road but nothing on the ground so far here in Volcano. Finger's crossed. I love the white stuff on the weekends but not during the work week.