Things I Learned During the Polar Vortex

Greetings from the former Polar Vortex!

As the temperature dropped lower, and lower, and lower I made a few observations.  I would have written them down sooner, but I needed to wait until I had thawed.

Here are my brilliant observations:

1.  People say ridiculous things when they are cold.  It's 5 degrees outside but with the windchill it feels more like negative 6 billion.   (This is not a direct quote from Al Roker, but it's pretty darn close.)

2.  And related to #1, what is it about the windchill that I find so annoying? It's as cold as a witch's titty outside. After a certain point, the temperature ceases to matter. It. Is. Supper. Cold.

3.  The super cold temperature causes flashbacks to my idyllic childhood when my own  mother would say on a cold winter morn, "It's as cold as a witch's titty."  What kind of mother would say that to their impressionable, young, naive, children?

4.  During the Polar Vortex when Al Roker is telling me the windchill is the root of all evil, I exclaim to my kids, "Geez, it's as cold as a witch's titty outside!"  I am my mother.

5.  My car knew this arctic weather was possible.  Which right away means my minivan is smarter than most of us.  That's right, my minivan knew negative 5 degrees was possible because when I started the car one morning, that's the temperature the car showed.  My minivan can show negative numbers and perhaps its the sign of my frontal lobe freezing, but I was amazed by this. My minivan knew it could get that cold.  This begs the question, "How low do you think the car can register?"  Seriously, does anyone know the answer?

6.  Strange stuff happens to my house when the temperature gets wicked cold.  For example, my garage door doesn't want to close automatically.  It will open just fine, but then it won't close.  Another strange thing that happens is I allow my kids to play electronics until they actually ask if they can do something else. Yeah, it's like the twilight zone over here.

7.  The Polar Vortex makes keeping New Year's resolutions nearly impossible.  When the temperature dips below 5 degrees outside, my instinct is to curl up in a ball and eat chips (lots of chips) right out of the bag.  So much for my goal of moving more and eating less!

8.  Freezing temperatures cause everyone with electricity to begin obsessing about electricity.  If the electricity goes out then we all know we will freeze to death.  My frozen body will be found in bed, in the fetal position with my hand deep in a bag of chips.  There are worse ways to go, people.

9.  Everyone acts as if freezing temperatures should be used as a teachable moment with our children.  Remind me why I'm standing on the porch in subzero weather with a boiling pot of water? Screw science. It's cold outside!

10.  Children cannot go to school in these temperatures because its just too cold.  This means disgruntled parents cannot send them outside to play either.  This leaves the children no alternative but to peck each other to death.  New Christmas toys?  Nah....  Way more fun to just annoy the begeezers put of one another.

Those are my observations now that the Polar Vortex as moved away and my bones are thawing. It's a balmy 20 degrees today.

I suppose I can credit the Polar Vortex for making 20 degrees feel like a day at the beach!