snow and other such things

Well friends, I've made a fool of myself giving my presentation for my big crazy paper which I cannot get excited about, but at least it's over, and I didn't die or burst into tears.

In other news, it snowed. Not too much. Just enough that driving was slightly exciting over the weekend, and I discovered a new ritual, an aspect of life in Minnesota that somehow I find fantastic. This is the plow-parking ritual. I don't know the ins and outs of it, but they plow certain streets at night, and then you move your car before 8 a.m. so they can plow the other streets during the day. I, of course, forgot this was going to happen, so I went out to my car about 7:50, when I was reminded by my roommate, who is responsible (unlike myself), going out to her car. I walked outside and down the street and saw people all over going to their cars, scraping off ice and snow, being Minnesotan. And I smiled and said to myself, "damn, it's cold" and regretted leaving my gloves inside.

As I was driving home from school on Saturday, which was the day of the snowfall, I was reminded of the one day it snowed in Rennes all those many moons ago...it never got too terribly cold in Rennes, since it's somewhat near to England, which tries to pawn its weather off onto Brittany. It did rain most of the winter, though, and wet cold is cold-cold. One glorious wonderful day, however, it snowed. All of five inches or so. Which caused the buses to stop, shops to close, people to drive about 3 miles an hour, and me to laugh heartily, before running off to make snow angels and drink hot cocoa and walk through the park with my friends. With that in mind, I was amazed at the effects of snow on people living in the twin cities...normally, I drive on a Saturday and think, at least once, usually more, that people just don't freaking know how to drive. When it snows, however, it seems people become much better drivers. I guess it makes sense...but still I think it's kindof funny.

Well, I think that's more than enough out of me. Moral of the story: I heart snow. Oh, other moral of the story: www.freerice.com Go here, play a fun word game, give free rice to people. You'll be glad you did. And if you're not, well...then I'll be hornswaggled.