Good morning, everyone.  It is gloomy but not wet--yet.  It is now very doubtful that we will get snow.  The temperature is 38 F at the moment.  From the forecast I saw this morning, we won't get much, if anything, over the weekend.  The weather people said that we have had five 50+ days this month where last year we didn't have any.

This story matches the weather here--dismal.  I only got through the first page and couldn't stomach reading any further.  I can remember a couple of times in the past ten years when I was sorely tempted to apply for a warehouse job and actually resented a representative at the personnel agency I had just signed up with for not sending me out to such a job.  To say I was desperate is understating my situation.  Reading this I am thankful I didn't get those jobs.

Yahoo news posted this amazing weather picture.

I have been reading stories about the rapidly cooling Chinese real estate market.  Here is another that brings to mind our not so recent past.  Their local governments relied on land sales while ours relied on property taxes--both are screwed for the same reason: plummeting values and demand.

John Aravosis at Americablog posted this item.  I hadn't read about this tactic and it wasn't mentioned in the couple of stories I read.  If this is Boehner's strategy it is indeed a slimy end run.  Aravosis has a link to The Gavel which covers the issue, with further links, in more detail.

I love blog that give me ideas on how to use items I already use in new ways.  This one talks about vinegar, describes how to make your own and lists a variety of items you can use to make homemade vinegars.