The Root Beer Blog

December 15, 2003

WinterGreenMountainStatement

Thrice already, this season, has New England been pummeled by storms, and thrice have we dug ourselves out. They have not been especially severe: no worse, to be sure, than the Christmas/New Year's storms of last winter...but there's something about them, something about their timing and insistence that upgrades them from meterological annoyances to wretched harbingers of a horrible winter to come. I'm talking about the kind of winter even your grandfather wouldn't mention; the kind of winter that makes men bestow names on their snow rakes; the kind of winter Norse gods inflict on followers who build their statues 15 cubits off the mark.

You fools! I indicated that tree over there! I cannot bear a statue here! An inch I would have forgiven...and possibly two. But fifteen cubits?! The devil winter for you! I'll leave just enough of you alive to rebuild a new civilization, more capable of fine measurement and following instructions! The rest of you had best fetch coats...

Forget, for a moment, your religious preconceptions, whatever they may be: you believe in Hell, and your greatest fears are sinning and going to Hell, except those are only your second greatest fears: your real greatest fear is that you were unspeakably evil in a past life, and you've already died and gone to Hell, and this is it: except it's freezing, not hot at all. That's the sort of winter I'm talking about, people. El Nino is alive and well, coming back for revenge. Don't let Jack London fool you, kiddies: Alaska's not the only place with harsh winters. We get our share, and I've got a hunch this'll be a doozy.

Still, I could be wrong: these could merely be regular storms, and we could be in for a winter with no evil overshadows, no cackling trickster gods.... And yet, either way, I must reflect for a moment on the joys of my coat.

Yes, my new coat, which I love like a son that never cries or asks for anything. It's a deep green & gray, and it fits like a glove. Inside, it has a removable fleece lining, which is now my fall coat. It has a waterproof hood, and pockets galore. It is a long coat, but it unzips from the bottom, so as not to limit my range of leg motion. Other features include something called a "radial sleeve," which I guess lets me move my arms in circles, and a deluxe ventilation system which means I can shovel snow without undue sweat. This is no mean parka, son: this is a fully modular, customizable, personal environment system, and with it I can laugh in Loki's face (until he turns it into a swarm of ravens that shit on my head and fly away).

Such a coat doesn't come cheap. I found it around 40% off, and had a $50 gift certificate, and I still couldn't believe I was about to pay this much for a coat. I justified it as being two coats, really, and since neither my winter nor fall coat were up to much more abuse, it seemed like a reasonable investment. And now, looking back, I'd highly recommend it to anyone.

But who in Loki's name cares about my coat? Colin Powell has cancer (Hah: Colin cancer!! Nah, prostate cancer...). And we've finally caught Saddam, which will be touted as a great humanitarian victory. And it certainly is, and I gladly add it to my short list of positive things I can say about the current American regime. Since it's still new & good news, I won't go off on the reasons people seem to have such a boner for the Iraq thing. I will say that most of the people who seem really charged up on "getting Saddam" and bringing about justice for all his horrible human rights violations seem, despite their deep and obvious passion for humanity, oddly unaware of other human rights crises around the world (or here at home). They also seem to have relatively bad attitudes about the actual Iraqi people who were victimized anyway, if not Arabs in general...so why the hurrah? Surely we're not scoring our political victories as humanitarian, spitting in the faces of those who oppose us? No! Well, we've been doing that from the get-go, I suppose. And my frustration with that, and all the spin that I can already see, crystal-clear, starting now and spinning on through W's re-election, and on and on blindly into the shitstorm that'll follow that horror...well, it's enough to drive a man to write about how great his coat is, instead of all the bullshit.

Ah, now see? My grumpiness has caught up to me. Anyway, it's a great coat. Columbia Sportswear. Warm, comfy. Good stuff.

Posted by Chris at December 15, 2003 08:50 PM | TrackBack