You might ask “what does increased levels of CO₂ have to do with peanuts?” Well, the climate experts that blog at World Climate Report have a baseball-related explanation:

Baseball’s Back - With More Peanuts Than Ever

For many citizens in the USA, this has been a winter for the ages. From no end of storms in the Southwest to record-breaking snow in the Northeast, this has been one long winter. But in Arizona and Florida, the boys of summer are dusting off their bats and balls and spring training is now underway. Fans are flocking back to the ballparks, and our consumption of peanuts is on the rise. American will eat more than 600 million pounds of peanuts this year at ballparks around the country (and elsewhere), we will eat over 700 million pounds of peanut butter, and we will spend over four billion dollars on our peanut habit.

What’s the climate change rub? Rising atmospheric carbon dioxide levels are enhancing peanut productivity and protecting the crop from the harmful impacts of atmospheric pollutants such as ozone. Which means more peanuts to go around. So next time you raise your hand and call out “Hey Beerman, how about a cold one and jumbo bag of peanuts!” remember that elevated atmospheric CO2 is helping to keep your bag full. [more]

We took a drive to Point Vicente today, as we often do. There is a pathway there, where we take our dog for a walk. As usual, we take a lot of pictures of the area. The photo below shows the coastline looking northward. Beyond the two coves below in the distance you can see Malibu and the Santa Monica Mountains through the haze. Click on the image to enlarge.

One of the shrubs we have planted to landscape the side of our house is a geranium. Every spring, it produces these really bright red flowers. The brightness and saturation of red on these flowers competes with the red, red tulips I posted about a while back. Click on the image to enlarge.

Here’s hoping that Emperor Zero gets less cooperation than this . . .

When we got up this morning, we stayed in our sweats and house shoes for most of the day until it was time to take our after dinner one-mile walk. I took this photo of my husband and “Bear” wearing their “jammies” on the patio this morning. Click on the image to see the full-sized photo.

I bought a package of freesia bulbs a couple of years ago and planted them in a large whiskey barrel planter in the back yard. The buds began appearing a week or so ago, but today the flowers looked pretty in the morning sun.

Click on the image to enlarge.

More about freesias . . .

Freesia is a genus of about 14 species. Freesia bulbs are usually grown for use as cut flowers. All the 14 species of Freesia are African in origin.

Of The 14 Freesia species, 12 are native to Cape Province, South Africa, the remaining two to tropical Africa, with one these species extending north of the equator to Sudan. Freesia flowers are very fragrant and are typically blue, white or yellow.

We have been hearing from climate alarmists lately that all this colder-than-usual winter weather is a result of global warming. In particular, winter storms and cold weather in Europe, like that which immobilized ferries and other vessels in the Baltic Sea this week. They argue that science has concluded it to be so - climate change is causing all this to happen.

Well, uh, no. It seems that even the liars at the IPCC haven’t tried to pass that crap off . . .

From World Climate Report.

The winter of 2009-2010 has produced its fair share of winter storms in the Northern Hemisphere – recall that President Obama arrived back in Washington from his appearance at the Copenhagen climate conference only to find the White House grounds buried under near-record amounts of snow. Europe and Asia have seen their share of large winter storms as well during the 2009-2010 winter. Hardly a large storm goes by without someone, somewhere suggesting that whatever we are seeing, it is related to “climate change”.

If one looked no further than the Technical Summary of the IPCC, they would discover that the IPCC is rather quiet on this subject with no claims whatsoever that winter storms will increase in frequency, magnitude, duration, or intensity due to the ongoing changes in atmospheric composition. [read the rest]

Emphasis added.

The flowers are starting to reappear in the planters out in our patio. I took this shot of these pretty pink daisies yesterday. Click on the image to view full-sized.