Cold and clear this hard-to-handle Monday — having some InterWebs problems for some reason this morning, but we’re trying again.
The weather has been absolutely gorgeous this past few days up here on California’s north coast, with more of the same forecast for this week.

Not so for a big chunk of the US — “wicked wintry weather” is bulldozing across the southwest toward the Atlantic Ocean, dumping snow, rain and general chaos on a big chunk of America during this holiday week.

(Illustration found here).

And it don’t seem natural: “This is not Texas weather, man,” driver Ron Taylor told CNN affiliate KTVT. “This is Alaska, or Idaho.”
Of course not, weather nowadays ain’t the regular natural us humans are used to and live with — the climate is quickly changing.
And in every detail of our local weather is now touched small or large by climate change — the air is warmer, holds more moisture and more craziness.
And it could get worse, and quick.

One of the frightful pieces to the climate-change puzzle is the horrendous methane stored in the Arctic permafrost, which naturally, is melting, and melting…
New research indicates it’s getting worse — the abstract at Nature:

Submarine permafrost on the East Siberian Arctic Shelf started warming in the early Holocene, several thousand years ago. However, the present state of the permafrost in this region is uncertain.
…
On the basis of the sonar data, we estimate that bubbles escaping the partially thawed permafrost inject 100–630?mg methane m?2?d?1 into the overlying water column.
We further show that water-column methane levels had dropped significantly following the passage of two storms.
We suggest that significant quantities of methane are escaping the East Siberian Shelf as a result of the degradation of submarine permafrost over thousands of years.
We suggest that bubbles and storms facilitate the flux of this methane to the overlying ocean and atmosphere, respectively.

Big storms are bad on a lot of things.
More on this from Climate Central:

When the hydrates melt, they turn into methane gas, a greenhouse gas that is 25 times more potent than carbon dioxide.
Methane hydrates are found throughout the world’s oceans but generally under hundreds of feet of water.
That means as they melt, there’s more time for the gas to disperse and mix with the surrounding ocean water.
But because the East Siberian Arctic Shelf is much shallower, with an average depth of 150 feet, there’s more of a chance for that methane gas to reach the surface.
That’s why understanding how much methane is stored in the shelf and if those stores are stable is so important to climate researchers.
…
Shakhova has spent the past decade compiling data on the East Siberia Arctic Shelf through research cruises and flyovers of the region.
She published initial results in 2010, which showed that methane has been escaping at hot spots where vents have formed from a combination of geothermal heat as well as warmer river water flowing into the region.
Those results showed that 7 teragrams of methane is bubbling to the surface annually.
That’s roughly the equivalent of 10 percent of the methane emissions from U.S. oil and natural gas production and transmission in 2012.
The new research refined those results, showing the amount of methane reaching the surface is more than double those previous estimates.
In all, Shakhova and her colleagues estimate that 17 teragrams are escaping each year, though the new study says the estimates are likely on the conservative end.
Shakhova said those totals are on par with emissions from the Arctic tundra.
…
Shakhova measured the amount of methane before and after storms in both the water column and atmosphere.
After storms, methane was greatly reduced in the water column, indicating storms were helping ventilate methane into the atmosphere more rapidly.
“We should have much more concerns regarding subsea permafrost than we previously had,” Shakhova said about her results.
…
David Archer, a carbon cycle expert at the University of Chicago agreed.
“In order to ignite an Arctic methane bomb you would have to ramp up (emissions) by a factor of 10 or 100 very quickly, and there’s no evidence or any proposed mechanism that could make it blow up that quickly,” he said in an email.
Archer also said that while the new research shows more methane is being emitted from the area than previously thought, it still represents only about 3 percent of global methane emissions from natural and human sources.

And another brick in that freakin’ wall.
And, just as another do-nothing round of  UN climate talks ended in Warsaw, Poland, though there was some agreement that countries have until the first quarter of 2015 to get their shit together. But don’t count on it: The fragile truce reached after the marathon talks in Warsaw may not even last as long as the delegates’ flights home.
Hurrah, here we go.

This shit don’t help — a big earthquake in a mostly un-earthquake place:

The U.S. Geological Survey says a magnitude-7.0 earthquake has struck in the South Atlantic, southwest of the disputed Falkland Islands.
It says the quake struck at 2:27 a.m. Monday (0627 GMT), about 195 miles (314 miles) southeast of the Falklands’ capital, Stanley, and 545 miles east of Ushuaia, Argentina.
The depth was a shallow 6.2 miles (10 kilometers).
…
The USGS says the quake followed four others that all measured more than 5.0, over a two-hour period leading up to the big quake.
It says such quakes are uncommon in the region.
Only 15 quakes of more than 5.0 had been measured in the region in the previous 40 years.

Odd the world nowadays. But, WTF!
It’s Monday!