Slide

We tried to do this yesterday, the snow fresh on the ground, but when we got out of the car, it as 16º and winds were 21 mph. Brutal. And the girls didn't have hats and Em didn't have gloves either. I decided frost-bit ears were not worth a little sliding.


Slide from Chixulub on Vimeo.

So today with milder winds and the sun out (it was still cold, 18º, but much more doable), we rode cardboard boxes down the snow/mud slope of the 'viaduct' (which is what locals call the bridge that goes over the railroad tracks). I guess 'viaduct' sounded more impressive than 'bridge' when the city fathers were floating bonds or whatever to build this bridge.



Wish they'd built two, the railroad crossing at the other end of town is a serious source of congestion now that we've grown from small town to outright bedroom community (the population has roughly tripled since I moved here eleven years ago, I think). That, and if there weren't the crossings, the town's biggest downside would go away, the constant wailing of train whistles.

Actually, I want to build a tunnel and make the trains go through that. Let them deafen themselves for a change.



I wanted to make a snowman when we got home. All the signs of good snowman making were there, the melt at the edges of the snow, calm winds and sun. I wondered why nobody was out building them, thinking 'You bunch of sticks in the mud!'

Then I tried a bit, and found that while the snow that was in the sun could be made into a snowball, it couldn't be grown by rolling that snowball. And the snow in the shade was powder. 18º, like I say.