i like spring... or maybe i'm just getting my hopes up

Okay, so we're taking kind of a different tack with this post.

I like spring. Why, you ask? It's only one season away from summer! It's summer that I'm truly partial to. (Or rather, it's summer to which I'm truly partial. Just for you, Dad.) Folk Fest, the lake, being able to go outside without mounting a major operation to get dressed, sandals (the ultimate in slip-on convenience)... what's not to love?

It's not that I don't like winter. It has its charms too. Bitter cold I can handle -- it just means staying inside when you can and more clothes when you can't. There are even fun things to do in winter. But ahhhh..... summer.

We've had several days in a row of mild weather, where it goes a little above zero in the daytime and a little below zero at night. We've even had some significant melting -- just enough to give Thunder Bay that "March" look: filthy snow and dirty slop. It's tempting me to think that maybe spring has sprung. Don't worry, I know better than that. Nobody remembers the March 1997 blizzard better than I. My arms still hurt from shovelling off the front steps, which were covered in snow deeper than my head. That's one of the few occasions where I've had to reach up, way up, to shovel snow. Hey, I even remember the May 2004 blizzard, even though it hit west of Thunder Bay and all we got was rain. (We went hiking in that snow a week later when we did Mantario. We pretended we didn't see the snow.)

But still... today it was 6 degrees and sunny. Oh, why, why do you tempt me so, you treacherous early-spring, you?