Baby, It's Cold Outside

Learn it. Live it. Love it.

What did the meteorologists tell you? They warned you it was going to get really cold after the twelve inches of slush fell on Boston yesterday. They warned you to shovel your sidewalks and clear off your cars before it got cold because it's hard to move ice when it has a death-grip due to temperatures in the tens. Did you listen? Well, I don't know about you personally. Nobody at the MBTA listened because the Washington Square T stop was buried under two inches of ice. Nobody on my walk to the train listened as I nearly fell on a patch of smooth glare ice. I was stuck behind a kid walking to school who wiped out four times in five steps she took. She gave up and just crawled along on her knees.

What is it about bad weather in New England that makes people's decorum go out the window? Last night as I rode the train to my hot date with Ryan Seacrest, someone in the back of the train pulled the cord and the train didn't stop. One person went to the front of the train to explain that they had missed his stop quietly and politely, and the T driver said something about her not hearing that a stop had been requested due to a problem with the equipment. I didn't think this driver was being difficult-- she'd opened the door for me to run onto the train instead of motioning for me to wait. Another guy who was further back in the train took a different tack when faced with adversity.

"I pulled the cord for my GOD-damn stop, lady! And you blew right by! You tell us to pull the cord for our stop and even then you don't fuckin' stop!" As he disembarked at the next stop, I'm pretty sure he called her a cunt. I hope the guy fell in a snowdrift and is frozen like a caveman. Assholery doesn't solve assholery, jackass.

To further enrich my commute, this morning everyone whose train went out of service decided to cram into my train at Kenmore. Which I understand-- Kenmore station currently resembles a bombed-out building from WWII-era London and is just as drafty-- but not to the point when I have to support some fat jackass who shoved himself into the train with the one arm I was holding a rail with. Somebody's breath was foul. I suspected another guy of trying to rifle through my purse. I prayed that a song that would blow out my eardrums wouldn't come on my iPod because there was no way I could reach it in my coat pocket to turn the volume down.

I have to remember the good times yesterday, though. I was repeatedly grateful for my Marc Jacobs wellies, which represent the best $35 I've spent in the past six months. While dainty women who couldn't bear to look like the Gordon's Fisherman as I did weaved around waist-deep slush pits, I stomped right through. On my walk home, I kicked the rock-like chunks of snow the plows kicked up, relishing how they exploded at the toe of my boot. Yeah, I looked so ridiculous that a two-year-old giggled when she saw me, but I was warm and dry. It was also fun to watch cars pull to the curb and get stuck in two inches of rapidly freezing slush. There were easily four cars I saw in my brief travels last night spinning their tires in futility. I traipsed along in my rubber boots triumphantly, trying to enjoy what little winter we've got.