According to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, 2015 easily broke the previous record for the warmest year that had been set just the previous year.

During 2015, the average temperature across global land and ocean surfaces was 1.62 Fahrenheit (0.90 Celsius) above the 20th century average,” said the NOAA report.

“This was the highest among all years in the 1880-2015 record.”

Compared to 2014, last year was 0.29 Fahrenheit (0.13 Celsius) warmer, the “largest margin by which the annual global temperature record has been broken.”

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The Powerball lottery drawing later this week has an estimated jackpot of $1.4 billion, the largest in US history, easily beating the $656 million Mega Millions prize in 2012. Although I don’t buy lottery tickets, the size of the prize made me wonder about the odds involved and whether it might be worthwhile to pick every single number to guarantee winning.
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After prolonged period of fall-like weather, today in Cleveland we saw sub-freezing temperatures accompanied by a mixture of snow, sleet, and strong winds that made being outside quite unpleasant.

We all know what that means: GLOBAL WARMING IS A HOAX!

Winter temperatures finally arrived this week in Cleveland, with daytime highs hovering around the freezing mark. This follows the warmest December on record. The snowfall was the third lowest on record with pretty much no snow at all, just three-tenths of an inch, very much below the average of 14.1 inches.
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The World Health Organization declares that Guinea is now free of the disease, two years after it made its appearance there, triggering a global panic. The disease killed over 11,000 people in that country and in Liberia and Sierra Leone. Liberia was declared disease-free in September while Sierra Leone was cleared in November.
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Those of us who live in the northeast of the US have all been remarking on how warm it has been, with temperatures often running at twenty degrees Fahrenheit over normal. Today is expected to be in the mid 60s, about 30 degrees above normal. It is truly strange to see people wearing shorts and walking their dogs past green lawns on Christmas Eve in Cleveland. In response to yesterday’s post, commenters who live in Australia also weighed in with how much of a heat wave they are going through right now.
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2014 had the record for the warmest year ever but its hold on that title will be short-lived since it looks like 2015 is going to eclipse it quite easily. In the UK, the British gambling firm Ladbrokes has for the first time ever stopped offering bets on a white Christmas, instead offering bets on record temperatures instead.
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Forrest M. Mims III is an award-winning inventor who attends conferences all over the world. This requires him to travel with all manner of gadgetry that contains exposed circuits and the like. Naturally this results in airline security becoming alarmed and he writes about his experiences, including one that ended up with him being put in a chokehold by the pilot of his plane.
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In our social interactions with others, there is often some touching involved, such as handshakes, hugs, pats, kisses, and so on. Clearly the limits are also influenced by the relationship of the two people and some things that are acceptable with friends may not be so with acquaintances. Complicating matters are gender and culture, with some societies seeking to eliminate contact entirely between strangers or acquaintances. This whole area is full of pitfalls that accompany inappropriate touching and I tend to take the cowardly way out and let the other person initiate the level of touch.
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