Winter Sucks, But Try To Enjoy It.

[KcMizzou]

Winter Sucks, But Try To Enjoy It.


If you're reading this, it's too late for me (to correct any spelling mistakes until Monday), for I'm in an airplane over the Atlantic. I've spent the last three months in Rome doing as the Romans-mostly crashing scooters and wearing tight pants, but now it's over, and I have no idea how to spend my time back home. To help myself, I've compiled a list of my old favorite winter activities. You might remember that I wrote a list of summer activities a few months ago. Don't worry, neither do I, but here's part two.

Winter is an amazing period of the year. The other seasons are filled with comfortable weather, which fills the average person with yard work and a guilty conscious if they waste a day. The cold season
relinquishes the human from both responsibilities. If someone wants his or her sidewalk caked in three inches of black ice for an elderly couple to break a hip or two, so be it, and if that person doesn't want to search for the few pleasures found in the achingly cold weather, that's A-Okay. So for three months a year, the world releases its grip on a person's ambition, allowing them to fulfill any goal or desire. These desires, coincidently, revolve around idleness, from the impossible (complete hibernation) to the accomplishable (watching eight hours of television in one sitting.) For centuries, snows ability to cover the earth with its perfect white surface has been compared to a blanket; but in reality, the whole season acts like a down comforter to the normal person, causing them to hit snooze for a quarter of the year. This has to stop. Get up and move your body!


Snowboard/Ski/Skiboard

Spending a day on the slopes is an enthralling adventure. The sun is shining, the breeze is cool against your red face as you careen down a mountain, the snow is beautifully covering up the solid ice, and the ambulance is exceptionally sterile. For those who've never experienced the raw excitement of skiing or snowboarding, go out and try one. It doesn't matter which, you'll break your wrist no matter what. Actually, just go to the hospital and thrust yourself down the fire escape, that way you're already near medical assistance and some kid wearing a dumb hat on a snowboard won't call you a Rump Ranger while spraying a ton of ice on you as you hold your severely broken arm.


Go Sledding

Sledding is a great mixture between excitement, sitting, and being uncomfortably cold and damp. Sort of like losing your virginity. So while skiing requires a low level of skill and coordination, the only thing necessary for sledding is a desire to get to the bottom of the hill.

Sledding was my favorite winter activity until the influx of plastic slides. I prefer my grandfather's steel runner. This thing's built like a medieval weapon. But now the cheap plastic things strip the snow off the hill, break easily, and what's the point of sledding if you can't sever an unsuspecting child's Achilles' tendon?


Look at the Stars

In case your job isn't filling its primary purpose, simply gaze up at the stars to feel insignificant and worthless. The unbelievable size of the universe is enough to crush any person's ego. Also, the stories behind the constellations are much more ****ed up than your anime bullshit.

Suffer Crippling Depression

This is quickly becoming my personally favorite. I used to spend the winter afternoons in my front yard making snow angels, now I curl up in my bed anxiously awaiting the sweet angel of death. Actually, depression is a lot like celebrating the Superbowl at my house in that it happens in terrible weather and requires three party subs.


Watching Sports

I already mentioned football, but there's also basketball and hockey, the
two most racially segregated sports America has to offer. Unfortunately, Columbus, Ohio doesn't provide many celebratory professional sports, but we do have a hilariously sports lopsided university! OSU gives the well-educated and groomed people of Ohio plenty of reasons for celebration. So OSU's second chance at the football national championship will fill the winter streets with either shirtless frat dudes chanting O-H-I-O and flipping cars because they don't quite know they're gay or elderly women wearing homemade sweaters and buckeye necklaces sobbing, their scarlet and gray face paint streaming down their face like some sort of clown funeral. Whoever wins, the majority Columbus's population loses.


Celebrate Holiday

I won't pick favorites. You've got three to choose from. Lets just hope you're right. Whichever you pick, I hope you enjoy eggnog. It's the only time of the year you can spike your drink at family gatherings and not be ashamed.

Aside from the major three, there's also New Years, which is the alcoholic uncle to the real holidays. All the other holidays are actual events, but this jackass shows up for like, two hours in the middle of the night wearing some dumb hat he's found on the ground, then sits his fat ass in front of the television to watch some Times Square bullshit before rambling incoherent resolutions into the night.


All right, who are we kidding? Winter only has one purpose.


Christmas Lights

As the leaves drop, many households fill their trees, picket fences, and gutters with lights. There has been a large politically correct drive to rename "Christmas Lights" to "Winter Lights." I completely disagree with this. The actual act of hanging lights around the house is one of the most confusing and infuriating task of the year and was originally done by Christians to gain a deeper understanding of the suffering of Christ. Though the original meaning left our culture years ago, people still go through the horrible process, until illegal immigrants start hanging up Christmas cheer for $5.25 an hour.

Christmas lights not only give the household something to do, but also provide the town with a night of fun. Many families pack into their cars, disregard any traffic laws, and slowly cruise around the neighborhood looking at people's lights. The twinkling, flashing beauty is an important and innocent moment in every child's life, while parents judge the neighbors based on their displays. The nature of Christmas lights has changed over the centuries, but the magic is always there. Maybe a brief timeline will help you understand.

Early Method of Chirstmas Decoration
Flaming Arrows: Though originally a weapon, the flaming arrow was the first advancement in holiday cheer. As pagan Vikings were catching thatch roofs on fire, some Frankish surf looked at his house, dotted with flames, and thought, "well, that certainly looks festive."

Artists Rendition of Victorian Fun

Luminaries: These things were the most popular form of displaying Christmas cheer during the most boring era of displaying Christmas cheer. The Victorian Era has given us nothing but self loathing. Now luminaries are only used by your crazy spinster neighbor who starts stealing your empty milk jugs around Easter.
White Lights: Originally intended to mimic snow. These lights have become extremely popular, to the point that many gated communities outlaw any sort of colored lights, which conveniently aligns with their racial policy.
Icicles:These things are becoming the "norm." Wake up people! Sometimes more isn't better. These things are the Baroque era of Christmas lights, where quantity and flashiness always beats out common sense.
Big Bulbs: I've talked to the ghost of Christmas (lights) Future and big bulbs are making a comeback, and if these bad boys are accepted again, then prepare to buy a set of armor and prepare for another invasion.

Whatever their purpose in modern society, Christmas lights have changed a lot since their inception, and will continue to evolve to fit our culture and fashion. Alternatively winter has sucked since the last ice age, when the whole year sucked.

Alright, I'm on my way back home, but no where in my list does it explain how to enjoy freezing sleet. So if you want to find real, exciting enjoyment through the winter, all you have to do is vacation someplace that isn't suffocating in its own terrible weather. Sorry.

- Ian "Salmon Season" Golding

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