Welcome to the Great Lakes region, home of the warm March sun......
High temps today
Detroit - 64
Chicago - 69
Toronto - 63
Minneapolis - 64
Milwaukee - 64
Cleveland - 63
The normal high for this date is 44 in Detroit, 40 in Minneapolis and 38 for Toronto, for comparison's sake
............
To set one new temperature record is a comparatively rare event -- but to set four of them over seven days is truly one for the books. Yet that's just what may happen over the next week here.
In what appears likely to become one of the most unusual early spells of mild weather to grace the Chicago area in 141 years of official weather observations, temperatures are on a path to surge past 70 degrees a majority of the next seven days.
The mid and upper 70-degree readings predicted over much of the coming week are more typical of those which occur two months from now, in May rather than March. Only localized lake breezes will interfere with the warmth.
And what could make the mild readings even more impressive is the amount of cloud cover expected to flood into the area as moisture arrives from the Gulf of Mexico. Typically, cloud cover restrains daytime warming. If predicted 70s occur even with the cloudiness forecast later this week, the warming will be truly unusual. ................(more)
The complete piece is at: http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/local/breaking/chi-skilling-rare-early-warm-spell-could-set-records-4-of-next-7-days-20120313,0,5221168.story
= new reply since forum marked as read
We had a very warm winter, and I worry about the trees (our apple tree, for example) that need a certain number of hours below freezing to "reset" for the winter and get ready for spring. We had very little snow and are in a drought, and any rain we get isn't soaking into the ground the way it should.
The ground is still frozen, so I can't plant -- I also live in a soil-poor area, so I don't have much of a garden. Besides, planting would mean we'd get a blizzard. That's how it works up here. 
Actually, I dislike warm weather, and prefer long cold winters and short but lovely springs and summers. It's why I live here, and I really dislike this current winter.
Hope my electric bill for the AC doesn't go thru the roof this summer.
Throughout December, January, and February, it was sunny almost all the time. At one point, we went three consecutive weeks without precipitation. As a guy who loves rain, I am very happy today.
62 degrees in Oakland, rainy weather until Monday next week. 
