Here's something you don't see very often...

With some saying this has been the coldest winter in 100 years, the great big lake I live near has frozen over.  This has happened before, but it is very rare.  Lake Superior is a big lake, so is Lake Michigan (the lower lake in the survey). You can read what the "experts" are saying here.

From the Canadian Ice Service...

As the Westerly winds push these plates of ice, I can imagine a whole lot of shoreline erosion this year!

 Good things - Blue sky, and the wolf and the moose on Isle Royal (that long island near the Canadian shore) can walk off the island, and new breading stock could wander onto the island.  Sort of a gene pool regeneration opportunity for that well researched predator - prey population. The ice makes for some very interesting and beautiful photos.

Not so good things - Cold cold cold... In North America the natural gas supply is strained, there isn't much left of my fire wood either!  Home and business heating costs have soared this winter, that will also translate into other hardships.  When this ice breaks up there will also be higher than normal shoreline erosion.  AND next summer will probably be really cold, as this huge heat sink will take a lot more solar heating to bring it up to it's usual 50's F mid summer surface temperature.  That makes a July wind out of the North turn an 85 F day into a 55 F day...