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stale soggy snow
Tuesday, February 4 2003
Yesterday when I was out driving around Kingston, the weather was so atypically warm (in the 40s) that yet again my hungry subconscious was fooled into thinking Spring was on its way. This lifted my mood to an extent I couldn't have predicted and it made no difference what my conscious mind knew about the length of upstate winters. My ubconscious is just as foolish as the magnolia trees in the parking lot across the street from Le Canard (which were budding in mid-January). That said, when Spring finally comes to this frozen wasteland, it won't be a moment too soon.
Today the weather featured another welcome springtime event: rain. Straight-up water fell from the sky. It was not mixed with sleet, nor did it form glazing on the trees. It fell onto the snow and disappeared into its voids, soaked up like a sponge. I told Gretchen that if the rain didn't wash the snow away the soggy snow would turn to concrete with the next dip in temperature.
This is early February and not yet time for a thaw, so only a little of the snow melted, just enough to clear the slatelike surface of Esopus Creek. Then at nightfall the world was paved with a bullet-proof layer of what had been stale soggy snow.
My last haircut was back in the summer and tonight I was joking with Gretchen that if I fashioned it into a mullet, I would blend in perfectly with the locals of Greater Kingston. I doubted that I'd turn even one head while going about my business at places such as Hannaford or Lowes. (Mind you, mullets aren't especially common in this area. But the people who wear them do so with non-ironic pride, and there's nothing all that exciting about seeing one.)
In an effort to forestall any mullet plans I might have, ironic or otherwise, Gretchen snuck off and got the scissors and started snipping away at the part of my hair that would have to remain uncut if I was serious about cultivating a respectable ape drape/Kentucky waterfall. I had to finish the haircut myself, since I couldn't leave it like that.
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