cousin vera

In the last hours of the 20th, snow started falling and it was slowly transformed to watery rain. The past two days it has been warmer and people started undressing in public. A friend said you could hear the birds chirping, but the true sound of spring is when the homeless have fled the shelters and invade the streets, calling, asking, pleading for a coin. Please, don’t look away, a coin because I am hungry, have a nice day.

The sun came out. Oh sí. The edigator is catching some rays.

Storms, pft!

So, they tell me a storm is coming. Beware, storm! State Warning, Storm! Classes cancelled, Storm! Be prepared, Storm! Someone Save Us, Storm!

My previous experience has prepared me to face a storm: if the storm has a name then you must prepare a survival kit of wine, tequila, beer and rum, cans of tuna and bottles of water. If the storm does not have a name, your survival kit is mostly liquor and crackers. So with this unnamed storm, I sat with my friend MCG to wait for the arrival of the help help storm.

And the hours went by between libation and monologues, I had even forgotten about the help help storm.

When her roommate arrived, covered in snow and hair, looking like a distressed yeti, I asked him has the storm had been postponed until further notice. He said, nay, it has been going on for the last hour or so. So I grabbed my coat and walked home. Snowflakes softly fell, in great proportions they floated down. Sound was muffled. I could hear my boots crunching as I walked, but that was it. No cars on the street, only glittery specks whispering down to earth.

This is definitely NOT a STORM!

Storms are fierce, vicious and brutal, full of sound and fury. They uproot trees, incinerate homes, hurl vehicles and cows through walls of concrete. This tender descent of endearing snow is more like a murmur than a roar.

Ok, for some a visual identification is clearer, STORM:

Not Storm:

So listen well, linguists, if there is no hollering and screaming and broken windows, no violent destruction of valued property… you need to change the name.

Storm, pft.

Happy End of December

It was until this year that I finally understood what that creepy song about the "White Christmas" talks about.
It is about snow!!! It falls freely from the sky.

Since I have been hearing corny dull repetitive carols I will join the hoardes and offer you my very favorite song of this season. I believe it is the one that best represents the joyous significance of this holiday, that of total binging and family fighting... sigh.

(that is why I will never understand a holiday like ThanksGiving... who has heard of a party without gifts? )

Colorful snow

See, the thing is that when snow is falling from the sky it floats gently, it is like tranquil rain, like a liquid sigh. It is beautiful and ephemeral. But then it lands on the ground and stays there.
For seven months.
I am delighted by snow in the air. But on the floor… The soil is blanketed with hard concrete that absorbs nothing. And people spit, vomit and pee on it. Then they walk their dogs who do the same. And let´s not forget about the squirrels, rabbits, other rodents and birds. Just in my bus stop there is a mound of crow excrement from two weeks ago. It was dropped, plop, and is still there.
Hence, the streets will be covered with snow and bodily (solid) fluids.

For seven months.

Yet everyone survives, they simply start putting up warnings for the children (and for the edigator):
Cover your ears or you might lose them.
Don´t lick lampposts.
Do NOT eat yellow snow.