Tag: brrr

Posted in weather

Baby it’s cold outside (for some of us)

Posted on by William Douthwaite

We had a taste of Florida winter this past weekend. I woke to below-freezing temperatures for the first time in a while. After rooting through my dresser for a hat and some gloves, I went out layered in a t-shirt, hoodie, and coat. Any warmth from the sun was an hour away as the big dog and I set out on our pre-dawn walk.

Most mornings we encounter a few other dog walkers. We were very alone on our neighborhood loop.

Except for one guy. One guy was out scraping a light coating of ice off a windshield. This one guy was in nothing other than boxers. No pants, no shoes, no shirt, no hat, no gloves. Just boxers. He smiled and waved as we walked by, as if it were just another balmy day in the south.

I’ll bet it hasn’t been long since he moved to Florida. Once you spend a few decades here, you break out the coat when it’s in the 50’s. Until then, you wonder why everyone is bundled up!

Posted in Christmas

The snowmen are back.

Posted on by William Douthwaite

IMG_7929When Eli and I were decorating the tree yesterday, I noticed that my collection of ornaments included eight snowmen. We haven’t bought any ornaments for ourselves, so all of these were given to us by someone sometime in the past. Try as I might, I can’t remember where any of them came from. But since the snowmen hold eight seats in our congress of decorations, I thought I would make a few observations.

First of all, they are all bundled up. Why? I would think that a snowman would revel in the cold. Yet the snowman uniform includes a hat, scarf and mittens. I figure they don’t need them to keep warm, so they must wear them to look “cool.”

Second, snowmen are happy. They are all grinning. Obviously they enjoy their seasonal jobs.  They only really work about four weeks a year. Plus, this bunch gets to live and work where everyone else vacations — Florida! Life is good for these snowmen.

Third, they have found their way into the celebration of Christmas. Frosty the Snowman, their patron saint, doesn’t appear in song until 1950, but scores a television special in 1969 to take his place in the highly competitive American Christmas landscape.

I haven’t made a snowman in over twenty-one years, since we’ve been in Florida. But the snowman is no less popular in the sunshine state than he was in the north. Our tree is testimony to that.