Wednesday, January 14, 2009

Baby, It's Cold Outside

Unless you have lived in Manitoba, you have no idea what 'winter' means. It gets damn cold here. Cold enough that people literally cannot leave their houses - we cancel plans and shut down schools because your skin can freeze so quickly that it's just not safe. Forget accidentally double-booking yourself... The biggest plan-killer here is the weather.

My plans for today have been shut down. And then I decided against my secondary plans because they would have required me to go outside. Instead, I showered and changed out of my pyjamas and into some sweats. Mat leave is RIDICULOUS some days.

So now Geoff is napping upstairs. Briony is napping downstairs. I've managed to clean up the remnants of last night's baby shower (put on by all of Geoff's coworkers), half-organized Briony's closet (she's going to be moving up a size imminently), and dug around in my cupboards for the ingredients I needed to mix up a massive batch of chili in my slow cooker. I fully intend to be productive for another hour or two, and then cocoon myself in a blanket on the couch for the rest of the evening.

To me, the funniest part of all of this is that I have no idea if it's *actually* super-super-cold out there or not, because I haven't been outside since yesterday morning. It was pretty cold then. I'm totally trusting (a) the Firefox weather thingy on the bottom of my internet browser, and (b) other people's weather-related Facebook status lines.

As a related side note... Geoff and I had CNN on this morning, and one of their top stories of the day is the 'deep freeze' that's being felt across most of the US. The temperatures in some of the central states are as low as -40 F (I literally have *no* idea how cold that is, and I'm too lazy to Google a conversion). They happened to have Winnipeg on their big American map, and we were showing an impressively low -58 F (again, this number is meaningless, apart from the fact that it was reported in a news story about how freaking cold it is outside). The reporter acknowledged the number, then commented, 'But once you're down to -40, it's really all the same.' It made us both laugh out loud. Even with a solid 20 degree difference, they just have to win, hey?

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4 Comments:

At January 14, 2009 3:28 PM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

Actually -40 F=-40 C then they diverge again.

My friend, Katherine, is SOOO glad she is escaping the Winnipeg cold...only 3C here today. Glad you can hibernate:) Love the pics.

 
At January 14, 2009 5:04 PM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

Ok, so I googled it, and -58F is -50C. That is nuts, and I have managed to stay inside all day too, then cancelled my evening plans. It's simply not worth it... :)

 
At January 14, 2009 8:55 PM, Blogger ka said...

I don't care what the temp is, I just hate that it cancelled a night with my girls. Do we get medals for being responsible parents? It probably happens rarely enough that it's worth noting...

He is sort of right about the whole "after -40" thing, though. Heck, I'd hibernate after just -20. I only live here because it hits +40 in the summer sometimes.

Corina called this morning to say it's 27 C in LA today. BRING IT ON. Poor Scarlett can smell fresh air again.

And Kris, who worked outside from 7-5 with only a half hour eating lunch in his truck, assures me they aren't kidding about the temp. I'll take his word for it... ;)

 
At January 15, 2009 7:46 AM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

The only thing I agree with that statement "once you are down to -40 it's all the same" is when they'll shut the school down at -46, but not at -44. Still damn cold. Still won't send my 5 year old out in that or drag my 3 year old out. Stay warm and snug.

 

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