Visit to Washington DC

Christmas break is almost over, classes start up again next week.  I've been in Pennsylvania the past week and leaving tomorrow to head back to Alaska.  Forecast for Chicago is "Ice Pellets" and 70% chance of snow so we'll see how that turns out, hopefully I wont end up stuck in an airport.  The forecast for tomorrow night in Fairbanks is of course -23F even though it's been warm (above zero) there a good chunk of the time I've been away.

Marisa and I took a day trip into Washington DC yesterday to see the pandas at the zoo and we checked out the national mall for a bit.  Not a lot of activity at the zoo on all the outdoor exhibits but it looked like an amazing zoo for when it's nice out and the best part is it's free.

Record Temperatures in January

I'm back in Syracuse, NY for the holidays from December 17th to January 17th and I'm missing some record breaking weather apparently.  I decided today to check the temperature and saw it was 25 degrees..... above zero.  Yesterday, caused by a big storm moving up the west pacific coast, brought very warm weather to Alaska's interior.  Fairbanks had a high of 41 degrees yesterday while Syracuse's high was 42.  I didn't know this at the time but apparently December was very cold, even for Fairbanks.  The coldest December in 30 years actually.

December had a mean temperature of -18 degrees with an average daily high of -11 and a low of -41.