>From 53 degrees North Latitude . . . Today the forecast is for the temperature to reach plus 13 C (56 F). The snow is almost gone and will likely disappear today. There are leaf buds on the trees. It has been warming since mid February. Forty years ago it was much colder at this time of year and signs of winter were around into May. The winters are just as intense, but they have been getting shorter for quite a while. They start late and end early. As an example, this winter we had a wind chill of minus 50 celcius. Okay - Jake. It's your turn to issue some reassurring weather words about cycles in the climate from the icy fields of California. :)

This winter, just outside Sacramento, where I live at altitude 150, I saw the first snow fall outside my window since 2002. It did not stick, however, on my drive into work I saw a light dusting on the side of the road. Prior to that I do not remember snowfall although supposedly it happened weeks before I was born in 1972. I have pictures of my father and his brother building a snowman in the back yard of the house they grew up in, where I live now, in the 40s.

>P.S. - http://www.recombinomics.com/News/03151002/H1N1_Swine_MN_IL_IA.html

PPS - http://www.miamiherald.com/2010/03/12/1527309/despite-flu-fear-cases-are-few.html
The flu season usually starts in November and winds down at the end of March. In a typical regular flu season, about 36,000 people die in the United States. This season, only an estimated 12,000 had died as of Feb. 13. That's even counting back to last April, when swine flu began.