The female Dawn Jogger met a former colleague for lunch on the Upper West Side almost directly across from where she is staying. A quick look at the map and it was obvious that she could get her exercise in by doing a loop. That the weather was very mild – temps in the 40s – made it more appealing.

Unlike yesterday when she was in Central Park earlier in the morning and had it almost to herself, by noon today it was brimming with visitors, that included joggers wearing shorts (heat wave!) and many, many people who were using the good weather to sit in the park and read or talk. (For the record, the female DJ didn’t think it was quite that warm.)

Her route took her over to 86th and Amsterdam.  Along the way the mounting garbage was as much in evidence as the melting snow (slush is better than ice by far). After lunch, she headed up Amsterdam through a neighborhood she found out is called Manhattan Valley, due to its depressed topography. She turned right at 110th and came back on the perimeter of the Park, passing the many museums that make up “Museum Mile.” It was a good five mile jaunt…

Five days post the big blizzard of 2010 Central Park remains largely snow bound. Even the main road that circles the Park had patches of snow on it (and no cars yet). The female Dawn Jogger did the full six mile circuit, dodging patches of ice along the route and enjoying the hills.  She was hardly early, setting out just after 8:30 am, but found few other fellow joggers or walkers out. It wasn’t cold – 30 degrees but no wind so felt warmer – sunny skies. The few who were out all seemed to be European. Where is everyone?…

That the female Dawn Jogger is doing that is a minor miracle, considering almost all the flights into JFK and Newark (and other eastern places were continued to be cancelled) Her flight showed an ontime departure of 10:45 when she got up yesterday but by 8:00 it was showing a 3:00 pm departure. Arriving at SFO, here airport journey began with changing stories why nothing was getting out. Wind sheer was an early reason. It may as much have been that workers, including air traffic control personnel, could still not get to JFK, so that limited capacity.

Her flight finally pulled away from the gate at 5:00 only to encounter mechanical difficulties so back to the gate. And by the time it got fixed, the pilots had “timed out, we’re no longer legal,” they’d been sitting around the airport so long.

Upshot, was the friendly skies folks pulled some 767 cattle car out of mothballs and loaded a couple of flight together on the red eye. So the female DJ arrived this morning at 7:oo am instead of last night at 7:00 pm.

Shout out to fellow traverlers Steve and Coral Wright who she met the right at the Red Carpet Room. Steve’s a 1K guy so could always get better answers and they were kind enough to invite the female DJ to join them for a pre-flight dinner. Good people from Sacramento!

Now finally the scene here. It is more snow than she’s even seen in Manhattan and clearly the issue is there’s no place to put it. It’s piled up every where and cars continued to be buried – she think the two pictured above were on 96th st.

All the snow means the kids are having a great time sledding and snow saucering in Central Park. (That’s the dark specs you see in the photo.)

To top it all off, the guy at the deli said it’s going to warm up to the 50s…

The female Dawn Jogger got on the road well before dawn and was treated to clear skies and the company of a hawk perched on a limb while surveying the field just north of Big Dish itself. That she was out early or that it was clear is not remarkable. What was is that she’d was home less than an hour when a pea soup ground fog appeared, drippy mist and all. That made the early morning run all the better…

No surprise – good cheer is plentiful when a three-year-old in the house. Especially one that is eager to open one present at a time and spend time playing with the new loot. The big gift from Santa was the DVD Alladin – the only thing Grace had asked for. But there were tons of other fun stuff, including a doctor kit she made good use of by checking Mommy, including “listening” for little brother. But the real giggles came when Grace herself decided to become a present. It’s been a lovely morning…

The dawn was appropriately red for the season this morning. The female Dawn Jogger saw the sun rise because she forgot she didn’t need to arise early today. (First appointment, pick up the snow ball desserts at 11.) Given that she was awake, she decided to get up and do “long Dish,” the route that takes her from home along Alpine Rd., then up the back side, turning right at the top and going all around, exiting just across from Lake Lagunita, heading home across the Stanford campus. As usual there was one member of the herd who was curious. Grace is on the way…

The female Dawn Jogger saw the sun rise this morning. That it rose is not the point. That she could see the sun after more than week of gray skies is. More rain is supposedly on the way Christmas Day. Oh well, too busy to dwell on it…

The female Dawn Jogger has mainly dodged the rain during the most recent storms and did so again this morning. She could see a veil of mist coming in from the West but did the washboard Dish run without a drop. She marvels at how mild it is this December – another morning out with just a shirt on, no jacket or gloves. Later in the morning she went with Scott to the largest private military vehicle collection in the world. That tale will be told on InMenlo…