This is the National Weather Service forecast for Iowa City this week. It’s been gross out. Muddy. Moist. Drizzly. Every time it drizzles I think, “This should be snow, dammit!” But instead we’re going to have a high of 52 on Friday and Saturday. This is crazy! I mean: yeah, I still get to ride my bike to work, which is great, but the weather really freaks me out. Not to mention the smell of rotting vegetation everywhere because of the moisture (that should be, um, snow). BLECH.

This is how Iowa City looked in winter time in 1913. This is a photo taken in February of that year. I don’t think it’ll ever look like this again, though. Incidentally, all those neat trees have been removed since then.

Which reminds me that last week I saw this interesting graphic about how the wheat crops of the U.S. will shift northwards to Canada, possibly by 2050!

Which means the climate personality of tropical regions south of here are headed this way.

Ugh, I hate humidity, I’m totally moving.

My dad visited Iowa recently from Flagstaff. Since he drove, he was able to bring this giant crate of relics from my childhood. It’s been nesting in his shed for years, since he sold the house I grew up in on 17th street in Davenport, Iowa. I had already been living in Iowa City for several years when the house was sold, so I didn’t really get a chance to go back and go through my many musty artifacts. Going through the box has been a strange trip. There are pictures I drew when I was a tiny tiny kid, and photos that my friend took when we were skipping class in high school. God I was a geeky teenager! I’d kind of forgotten. Anyways, I thought I’d start posting some of the stuff here and writing what I remember about it.

I’m starting with the wooden sword I made when I was 7. I still remember making this in the basement of our house, clumsily nailing the boards together and then later adding (haha) tiger stripes, then still later, just making the whole thing black. I remember my friend’s older brother wearing my devil cape and racing my dirt bike up and down our street, brandishing the sword. I got a ton of mileage out of that thing, prowling the neighborhood in Davenoport. It’s light, and the grip still fits my hand perfectly.