Weather Report

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: I’m a So Cal girl, born and bred, so warm weather is important for my psyche. I love New York, no cliché, I really do, but I couldn’t live there in January. I think Chicago is one of the most vibrant cities I’ve ever been in, but one big storm and I’d be outta there. I imagine myself as one of those gaudy, giant-hat-wearing biddies on the beach someday. If I could live anywhere, it wouldn’t be a place where it snows--except maybe a place where it snows once in a hundred years and the news makes the front page of the newspaper. That would be acceptable. I know that those of us who love the sun are legion (Are there any songs about Minnesota girls? Are postage stamp-sized pieces of property a million dollars in Iowa?), but, to my surprise, we aren’t the only game in town. And this time of year always reminds me of that with people glorifying snow, traveling to snow, and lamenting the lack of snow. I still find the snow fixation a bit mystifying--no airport was ever closed for too much nice weather and no car ever slid on patches of sun--but there are diehards who find the benefits outweigh the negatives. Apparently, they’ve got company. In Margaret and H.A. Rey’s Curious George In The Snow, the monkey who’s game for anything goes ape for the white stuff. What does he know? He’s a monkey.

http://www.amazon.com/Curious-George-Snow-H-Rey/dp/039591907X

http://www.houghtonmifflinbooks.com/features/cgsite/history.shtml