Baby, It's COLD outside

Shiver me timbers, it's c-c-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-l-l-l-d-d-d outside!

When the car utters an audible, "Really?" when you first place the key into the ignition, you know it's cold outside.

As I walked out of the convenience store with an ice filled Diet/Mt Dew mix and saw steam rising from it, I knew it was cold outside.

The boat in the picture, would you believe it was open water before this cold fell? (Ok, it wasn't, but this is a blog - not the New York Times.)

Trees are murmuring about the frigid temperatures passing through their branches and the chirps and tweets are frozen before leaving the beaks of birds.

Since this is Wisconsin, and even though it's not been this cold here in two years, we muddle on, pleased with our handling adversity with dignity.

You know it's cold, when you greet a fellow traveler words that it'll be 20 degrees warmer tomorrow.  Of course, when it's below zero, a 20 degree warm up is welcome, but it's still chilly.

As I made the journey from car to building this morning- the cold reality helped wake me up to the reality that a slip on the ice resulting in a quick trip to unconsciousness would a bad way to go - but the upside would be the Dew would last for a while before it was frozen solid - and hopefully I would be awake again by that time.

The cold is a fact, heat is an illusion mixed in sweat.

Cold is reality and the stark realization that you are alive as the cold air sends tiny shards of ice through every crease in your lungs.

Aaah, it's a great day to be alive, and in just 58 days it will be the first day of spring.  Maybe the lakes will be free of ice by then.