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It Was So Cold ...
Dave Rasdal
Jan. 21, 2009 8:00 am
... and now it's a lot warmer -- maybe 60 degreees warmer if you recall the 30-below zero temperatures of last week.
Still, I hope you didn't forget that I promised to follow up on my Friday column in today's Gazette (see today's Ramblin' column) after asking readers to finish the statement, "It's so cold ..."
With responses coming from The Gazette, GazetteOnline and this blog, here are some of my favorites that didn't make it into today's paper.
"It's so cold ..."
- ... we needed archaeology skills just to read the newspaper. There we were - hair dryer and tweezers in hand - thawing and carefully peeling off one page at a time.
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... football fans were actually ordering hot cocoa at the game.
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... they took down the sign that said "Water Park" and put up a new one that said "Luge Run".
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... instead of yelling "freeze", the cops just yelled "go outside!"
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... dad traded in the family car for a zamboni.
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... I tried to take the garbage out - but it didn't want to go.
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... it took me two hours to walk one block - my shadow kept freezing to the sidewalk.
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... my car wouldn't run - but my nose wouldn't stop.
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... that when I come indoors my contact lenses fog up.
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... that women aren't even thinking twice about asking total strangers: "Will you jump me?"
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... when I went to start my truck, I had a cup of coffee in my hand and it froze so quick, the ice in the cup was still hot.
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... pirates are shivering with their timbers.
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... even McDonalds is in a hiring freeze.
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... I saw a Polar Bear wearing a parka.
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... my roommate from Alaska closed the bedroom window.
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... that my hands are to cold to do my homework.
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... that I wonder why I am still living in Iowa.
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... Minnesotan's are showing us pity.
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... that when you speak outside people can't hear you, but in the spring when it thaws it makes the darndest racket you ever heard!
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... that Quaker Oats is producing frozen cereals.
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... even the snowman wants to come inside.
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... I'm shivering like a mobster in a tax office.
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... refrigerators are redundant.
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... lawyers had their hands in their own pockets.
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... you bake a cake, set it out to cool, 10 minute later it's frosted.
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... prisoners were BEGGING for the electric chair.
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... people were flicking their Bics in their POCKETS.
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... I saw a squirrel burying Sterno!
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... when you opened the door to the house the small light in front went on.
And then there's former co-worker Tony Staab of Cedar Rapids who is enjoying 70-plus degree weather on South Padre Island in Texas, reminding me of my week down there in 1995 to visit with Iowans on long winter breaks.
"It's so cold," Tony wrote, "that Rasdal tweeted Steve (Buttry) that he would be in The Rio Grande Valley a few weeks to do a follow up on Eastern Iowans that are Winter Texans."
Come on, Tony, you know I can't get away that long. And that's cold!
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