-8

The window in my bedroom leaks. I started noticing it in the fall when I could feel the cool night air blowing on my face. I avoid making personal calls on my cell phone at work during the day, and since I cannot directly see the dollar bills flying out of my wallet from the extra energy costs, I haven't called the office to complain about it. But holy Dakota winter, it's negative eight this morning. And when I was laying in bed this morning a little after five with the covers over my head to avoid frost-bite, I resolved to make that call.

We had an all-company meeting yesterday morning, and one of our execs compared current CO weather to ND. Not quite, sir. I'm sort of prideful and full of myself when it comes to people talking about the Dakotas - especially when they are doing any kind of negative comparisons. I get to make fun of South Dakota and North Dakota. I get to lump them together as the Dakotas. But, hmph, I grew up there. You didn't have to drive six hours to Grand Forks in January, play in a hostile environment, get f-bombs hurled at you in front of God (and worse, your mother), get beat by 40 points and have the bus break down two out of four years on the way home. I have such fond memories of the Pit at UND. I remember walking the fifteen steps from the gym door to get on the bus after games and feeling the winter wind go right through all my clothes, no matter how many layers.

One year the defrost went out on the bus. I was a freshman, and since I didn't have any friends no one wanted to sit with me. That was the only year we traveled with the men, but everyone shared a seat. Except me, which was nice because it was nearly dawn by the time we arrived back in Sioux Falls. (As a side note, traveling with the men also meant the movie selection was Space Balls and Young Frankenstein) I suppose it was around 2 am on Sunday morning when we crossed the border and stopped at an Indian Casino to try to fix things. It's an interesting crowd that is in a casino on the ND/SD border in the middle of the night on a Sunday. We had mechanical issues again when I was a senior - the break fluid or something kept freezing. So we had to drive slow and stop every twenty minutes.

The worst part of mid-winter road trips was getting back after the bars closed to dark, cold cars in the parking lot. I had to wake myself up just long enough to get really, really cold and drive four blocks back to my dorm. After one trip the smoke alarm battery in my room was dying and beeped every minute. I finally had to give in and call maintenance to fix it before I could sleep.

I have a 100ft drop chord in my storage closet. I was thinking out loud to a co-worker before the Arctic blast hit that I would probably get it out, snake it from my apartment, down the flight of steps and to my car in the morning to make my battery happier about having to turn the engine over in single-digit weather. He looked at me funny, "You have a block heater on your car?" I returned the confused look, "You don't?" I remember when we bought my car, Dad had them put one on as a necessity. It's like front wheel drive. And mud-flaps. Actually, my car doesn't have mud-flaps. But my mini-van did. So when I got my car, I wondered why it didn't have mud-flaps. I thought everyone lived down a gravel road.

I admit that CO weather spoils me. Not necessarily the temperature, but rather the lack of humidity and perpetual sunshine. In November of 2004, I was still living near Winter Park. There was a cold spell, and I woke up one morning to a crisp -20. People were talking about how cold it was, but I remember the morning rather as clear clear clear. There was no wind, a beautiful winter sun shining and the mountains. . . lo! the mountains!

January and February at home are long, cold, gray and windy. The wind blows across the plains straight into your soul. My skin turns gray. My mind turns gray. My eyes glaze over. I develop a perpetual twitch. Or rather, I used to. Now I'm just full of myself listening to people complain about the cold. There is no wind. There is no humidity. An occasional use of my drop chord is a welcome alternative to weeks and weeks of never feeling completely warm and not seeing the sun.

This is the fourth week in a row - usually falling on a Friday - that we have dealt with inclement weather. Frigid temperatures are a bit easier to deal with than feets and feets of snow. (That's right, feets). There is a draft coming from somewhere, and I'm wearing my smart wool socks. My schedule today is as following: drink coffee until noon. Change out of pajamas into sweat pants. Watch football. Eat melted cheese. Call friend in Alabama and complain how cold it is. Avoid opening the door. This isn't So Dak, but I don't profess ability to survive there.