Weathering It

It snowed, finally and gorgeously, today. It took about an hour to complete my usual 20-minute commute, but on the plus side I saw not one but two Jaguars almost spin out at the corner of 6th St. S and 2nd Ave. N. downtown. Our new neighbor used his snowblower to clear our walks and driveway, which was phenomenally nice of him. The snow is just the thing to make the winter seem perfect, even with the proverbial "near-blizzard conditions."

As I stood outside waiting for my bus this afternoon, smiling because the snow and the wind and the chill felt so right (so U.P.!), I thought about the miserable weather last Friday. How miserable was it? Well, last Friday's high here in Minneapolis was -1°F. In Irkutsk, Russia, that same day, the high was 14°F. Translation: it was warmer in Siberia.