Ice Age

Though Gothenburg sometimes goes directly from fall to spring, winter (defined as five days with an average temperature below zero) did indeed arrive ten days ago, which made it possible for people to go ice skating on Delsjön last night as I went for an extended lake loop during William’s chess class. But already this morning, the temperature was well above zero again and, with a fresh low pressure coming in from Greenland, it is forecasted to stay that way for the coming weeks. As such, this may well be all the winter we get this year in Gothenburg. Which, ignoring the climate change dimension for a moment, feels kind of good as Anna and I can now do the Mountains of Mölndal group run tomorrow in ice-free conditions. And on Sunday, I hope to meet up with Elin who is here for the Gothenburg Horse Show and do a technical trail run together.

In other news, I am as confused as everyone else about what is actually going on with regard to Trump and Ukraine. As humans, we always strive for ontological coherence even when there is none, but the best I can think of is that Trump wants to weaken Zelensky’s relative position to make him quickly agree to a peace deal. While many analysts had thought that Trump would rather be pushing Putin to the table by threatening to double-down on America's support for Ukraine, that strategy always had the risk of Putin not yielding and instead sparking global conflagration. After all, Ukraine cannot win on the battlefield and push back Russia back behind its 1991 borders without risking nuclear escalation. And as much as I feel sorry for Ukraine, ending the world is not the best way to protect its long-term interests.