It’s January and it’s cold.
The wind is blowing 25 mph and the flag is erect like a sailor on liberty.
The wind chill is near intolerable and life is just harder.
It’s harder to walk, harder to breathe, harder to use chop sticks in a Chinese restaurant with a low health dept score.
It’s so cold, it feels like the dark side of the moon.
People on facebook in California are posting pictures of the beach.
F*** you people on facebook posting pictures of your 77 degree day.
It’s like teasing starving kids in India with cotton candy.
Would you do that?
Well would you?
Look at our facebook pages and show some respect.
Does negative horrible mean anything to you?
I want you to feel the same pain I’m feeling.
I want you to walk outside and see snowmen grimacing.
I want you to feel the wind rip across your skin like jack the ripper strangling hookers in London.
Keep your sunshine and beaches to yourself.
Can’t you see people are freezing out here?
So I turn on the tv.
Guess what? The weather man is screaming about polar express this and frontal system that and God forbid black ice.
Run for your lives! Winter is upon us.
It’s so cold, pipes are crying.
Anything liquid is going to freeze.
It’s like a primordial stew of frozen death.
Time slows, water hardens, lives grow faint.
Over-passes freeze first they always say.
They are right. Be careful.
The temperature dipped below freezing hours ago. If this was a 3rd world nation, nobody would have the energy for a coup.
It’s so cold, the temperature is now hovering between detrimental and devastating.
Precipitation has surrendered itself to the forces of evil. Water has died, allowing its molecular structure to be transformed into something evil, something cold, something that can kill.
It’s so cold on this night, Eskimos won’t rub noses, dogs won’t stop to sniff each other’s butt.
It’s so cold, pan handlers won’t pan handle.
That’s like the sun refusing to rise.
I look outside. The asphalt is covered with a layer of black ice so furtive, so shimmering, it fools your tires into thinking traction can be attained.
Ha. Ha. Ha. tires. There is no traction.
Traction is a frozen pipe dream. Traction is a physics theorem talked about in science books.
It’s too cold for friction. It’s too cold for wooly mammoths to defrost and take over the Earth.
The grass is stiff with frost. It looks like a million green soldiers watching a USO tour with scantily clad Angelina Jolie on stage.
When I say it’s cold, it’s not just cold, it’s deep purple on the weather map cold.
So what do I decide to do?
Eat ice cream.
Getting ice cream during a winter advisory is like going to an outdoor soup stand in Miami in August. It’s like showering after getting caught in a rain storm. It’s like eating saltine crackers and washing them down with saw dust.
Ice cream in icy weather? It’s excessive.
But when life’s crazy, excessive is part of the plan, and ingesting ice cream when the wind chill is outer space like is just par for the course.
So I take the kids to the local ice cream parlor. There isn’t a car in the parking lot. It’s desolate, like a hair metal band at a church jamboree.
“Is it even open,” my son jokes from the back seat.
Good question.
A gust of wind from Nome Alaska blasts against the side of the car. The windows are closed, but the wind is so ferocious, so invasive, it seems to infiltrate the passenger compartment.
I watch as the paint disintegrates from the metal.
I shudder. I look at the snowflakes whipping like an angry winter tornado against the building illuminated in the car’s headlights.
I stare at the ice cream parlor. The sign in the door says open. There is a lot of pink neon spilling through the glass.
“You guys ready. It’s not 18 degrees in there. Let’s do it.”
We get out of the car and the winter wind blows into our faces. It’s shocking like staying on 20 and watching the dealer pull a five-card 21.
I feel like the guy trying to plant the flag at the North Pole instead of the guy just trying to put some sugary goo into his kid’s blood streams.
“It’s cold,” a voice shouts behind me.
I don’t recognize the voice. I’m sure it’s one of my kids, but it’s too cold to care. The wind is in my ear, whispering evil thoughts.
“I’m going to freeze your face off motha-f****!”
I look up at the starless darkness. Did the wind just say that to me or am I hallucinating?
Old man winter’s a son of a bitch I think to myself.
“OK, let’s go,” I say as we head to the door with the inviting image of a cow who can never eat enough ice cream.
We put our heads down and lower our bodies to aerodynamically push against the gale force wind.
I suddenly understand what the violinist on the deck of the Titanic was thinking as the ship began swirling around the drain pipe of the Atlantic.
It’s mind numbing cold.
I pull open the door and there is the immediate rush of air.
It sounds like the vacuum seal of two space ships when the hatch is opened and the air from each ship rushes to fill the other vessel.
I only hope the stagnating air of the Russian ship does not smell of Vodka and body odor.
I hear a melodic ding dong over my head as we step in.
The kids move quickly, as if there are free itune cards piled inside.
I let the door close and I stand still. I let the 65 degree ice cream store warmth bathe me in resuscitation.
The store is quiet. I can almost hear ice cream screaming from the frozen case; “go away. Leave us alone. You don’t want us. Who eats ice cream on a night like this? What kind of father are you?”
I look around the store. It’s as empty as the brains of the cast of Twilight.
“Where is everyone?” my daughter says moving to the ice cream counter.
I immediately get a bad feeling. Have the employees been robbed and they are tied up in the back? Is the gunman still in the ice cream store and I am going to have to throw sugar cones at him because I left my 357 in the car?
Suddenly a cute 17-year-old pops out of the a rear office.
“Hi,” she says with an I’m sorry kind of grin. “You guys are our first customers all night.”
We all laugh at the absurdity of the statement.
In the summer time, this place is rocking till midnight with lines out the door.
Tonight, when you can even see your breath inside, we are the lone dollars meandering the strip mall.
“What can I get you?” the young girls says.
The kids move to the counter.
“How bout another coat?,” i joke.
She smiles and the kids begin pointing at buckets of rich delicious goo.
We had a great time together, but 18 degree ice cream night is certainly crazy.
Life’s Crazy™