It's freaking cold here. About 25 F. It's so cold, I saw a funny car on the way to school and I was going to write down something about it, but I couldn't write anything because my hands were in two pairs of gloves and so cold my dexterity score went to zero. So you'll just have to imagine what I might've said, I can't remember.
There's quite a bit of snow here now - we got a fresh 4-6 inches last night. It's super powdery, so you can't really make snowballs out of it, but it's really pretty. Unfortunately for me, the Germans are used to this sort of thing, so I have to go to class; this is a problem for two reasons. First I have to sit in a lecture hall and watch the PhD students play outside. Second, all my outdoor movement algorithms are completely flummoxed by this much damn snow. The parts where lots of people have walked are really slippery, but so are the parts where no-one has walked! THERE ARE NO OTHER PARTS! About every ten feet or so I have to stop and get my bearings after defying gravity and keeping my feet under the rest of me. And where the snow is still 4-6 inches deep, I've realized why everyone in Lord of the Rings (apart from Legolas) was always "trudging." There's no other word for it. It's the sound one's watch makes in this much snow.
I realize, of course, that maybe half a foot isn't a really huge amount of snow by the standards of some. But I haven't seen this much snow since I was four and could basically be air lifted into the car by more experienced trudgers. I know that ~25 F isn't really that cold either, to anyone currently living in the Midwest (which is a funny name, isn't it? Should be more like Northmid or Midmid), but I wasn't expecting it to be so cold. Wikipedia told me that this was the coldest it got in Heidelberg! ...On average! I shouldn't have to go buy a freaking scarf. (I thought I'd make a joke here about how Wiki should buy me a scarf AND pay the damn customs tariff on it, but I don't think I've gone a day in about four years without reading something awesome there, and I've never donated, so I think I'd feel too guilty. Plus it'd be too much of a digression.)
My nose runs constantly in the cold. Fortunately they sell pocketpacks of some sort of Kleenex-analogue by the dozen for cheaps, so it's not too terrible. You know, when Napolean invaded Russia, he put big ol' brass buttons all over his soldier's uniforms so they'd quit wiping their noses on their sleeves, which just astonishes the hell out of me every time I think about it. I'd much rather have troops go out with streaky uniforms than the hellish tickle of a drippy nose. Especially against the Russians, who were probably armed with pocketpacks of Kleenex. Maybe they'd offer spares to the French as defection rewards.Anyways, Yandee's nose does not run in the cold. I thought, maybe this is a white people thing. But I've looked it up now, and it turns out the cold air hits the warm air in your nose which makes water vapor from the outside air condense. This mixes with mucous and makes it runny (see here for elaboration). This shoots down my theory, since Yandee definitely has runny noses at other times. Maybe her nose is just colder?
Dear reader, you've probably read through this whole post, wondering when I would get around to what was set on fire, and were probably irritated at some point that I hadn't mentioned it yet. Well, here it is: Yandee and I went out to get a currywurst (basically the taco-run equivalent in Germany), and sat down with our food at a little table, after stripping off our outermost winter layers. There was a tea candle on the table. We didn't even her scarf was on fire for like half a minute, because we figured the smell of burning acrylic yarn was totally just an overdone feuerwurst.
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