Snow What

Jen lives in our neighborhood, but she is from Michigan, and her blog recently was bemoaning the lack of a "real" winter in Indiana. Real winter being what Michigan gets, a solid 6 months of snow, no mid-winter thaws. I find this pretty funny, since to me, Texas-California hybrid that I am, Indiana is the Great White North.

I was telling my mom about last weeks snow. It was maybe a total of 5 inches between two or three days, nothing like Columbus OH's 20 inch blanket. Arabella wanted to make a snow man, but the snow was light and fluffy, powdery, and not good for snowman making. Mom was surprised there was such a thing as not-good-for-snowman-snow* and laughed when I told her about my first time visiting my future in-laws for Christmas, waking early one morning and running outside to make a snow man. I made a tiny snow mound. Michael had to explain to me about "snowman snow".

So mom asks me: "How do you make a snowman anyway?"

"You know those pictures of kids rolling snow? That's it. You roll the snow around in a big ball until it gets big enough."

"Really? Well, how do you get the big ball started?"

"Well, you pick up a chunk of snow and flop it on another piece of snow, and keep doing that until it gets big enough to roll."

"Huh. How about that."

"Yep, just like those pictures. Isn't it amazing?"

Michael says this is why the rest of the country thinks Californians are really annoying.

*Aside from one year in Seattle, Mom has lived her life in San Antonio and Los Angeles. Although there is snow on the mountains above L.A. neither my mother nor myself are really interested in skiing or other snow visiting recreation. We just think the snow is pretty from afar, and if it leaves us alone we'll leave it alone.