Undoubtedly you've heard this already but I had to have a post noting this week's news that 2014 was the hottest year on record, possibly the hottest year in the last two millennia; that ocean life faces a major extinction event; and that sea level is rising faster than we thought.

Those articles are a pretty big downer, especially the one about marine life. Having just finished Elizabeth Kolbert's book, The Sixth Extinction, I'm not feeling all that upbeat about humanity as a species. We're on the edge seeing some big changes and losing a lot of species, not to mention causing some serious alterations to the landscape.

Alterations like, say, the shrinking of glaciers, the melting of arctic ice sheets and the exposure of snowy peaks in the dead of winter. I'm still holding out hope that all this news will be something of a wake-up call for people. And, to avoid a complete depressive state, I tried to have a little fun this afternoon.

Below, you will see the intrepid explorer B. Tiberius Cat as he approaches the top of Mount Mouser.

On a January day, when you would expect the barren slopes to be frozen over with treacherous ice and battered by unrelenting winds, our hero easily achieves the peak...

...and laments how little snowpack remains on this natural wonder. Soon this snow mound will be as Mount Kilimanjaro - barren, exposed, just a shadow of its famed, snowy glory.

Disappointed, B. Tiberius Cat begins his arduous descent, back to civilization where he plans to inform the masses of an unfolding environmental tragedy.