Try 22 Degrees Below Zero

Back from skiing in Vermont. Okay, I rushed off Friday, not bothering to check out a certain key piece of data -- the weather report.

On the way up, I'm noticing a lot of ice on the car windshield. My son's in the back seat doing the kind of things 7-year-old boys like to do, drawing on the window, but it's making a slightly weird noise. Like he's scraping through ice to engrave a message for me. The heater's on full blast, the heat of our bodies is keeping us warm and then I suddenly GET IT -- it's not ice just on the OUTSIDE of the window -- there's also a lot of ice on the INSIDE of the window. I think, "Hmm, must be pretty cold out."

We get to our bed & breakfast late Friday night. We get out of the car. "Hmmm," says I, "it's a little chilly." Chilly like you breathe in and you feel like your lungs are getting cryogenically preserved for the next 1000 years or so. Hey, I figure, it's Vermont, it's supposed to be cold up here.

Next morning, I try to start the car to head over to the ski rental joint. VERY SCARY NOISE. I have never heard my car make such a noise -- rather like an animal shuttering and begging not to leave the barn. I think "Damn, now my car's falling apart." I have to warm it up a long time.

Get over to the rental place early -- hate the lines. Weirdly, there is NO ONE there. The local boys in those wool jesters hats are teasing one another about not even bothering skiing today. I ask them what's up. They look at me like I've arrived from Mars -- "Lady, it's 22 below zero." Aha!

Did we ski? You betcha.