Wild ride with the weather

Moose Lake resident Karen Slater captured this photo of a late-season watercraft rider on Moosehead Lake Sunday, when the temperature reached into the low 70s. Less than three days later, Carlton County got more than half a foot of snow overnight Tuesday. By 9:30 a.m. Wednesday, Cloquet's Darin Nelson, below, had already used the snowblower on his sidewalk and driveway and was cleaning up with a shovel with a remarkably sunny attitude considering the wet heavy snow that made up the bottom layer of the fresh snowfall. When asked if he was ready for winter, Nelson said he was, but barely. "I just finished putting things like the picnic table away last night," he said. "I told my wife, I don't think I'll ever stop doing these things last-minute."