You probably had the same experience during last week's Attack of the Polar Vortex: You'd be talking to someone in another city, and they'd say, Wow, how do you survive?
Well, I don't strip naked, cover myself with fast-evaporating alcohol and run around outside, for starters. We have this thing called "a civilization" with heat and everything.
Yeah, I know, but I saw on the news where it was like 40 below in some town called Humiliation.
That's Embarrass, up in Mortification County, and that's at least — hey, wait a minute, you're in St. Louis Park.
Well it's 14 below here but I see it's 16 below in the Cities. How're you managing?
If you didn't get the taunting call from sunbird relatives — which is like someone who had the money to flee the Black Death and calls to say "How's the plague? Saw on the news they're dying like flies!" — then you missed the opportunity to defend the Polar Vortex. It brought us together as a people, united in our desire to not lose a toe if we could avoid it.
Unless you were a teen who headed off for the bus undressed because some theoretical peer might judge your mittens, and required a parent to intervene: "Wear this or your nose will die. Do you understand? You will not get a letter of recommendation from the Teen Council of Awesomeness for sacrificing your nose because scarves are lame."
You watch them march down the street and take off the scarf when they think they're out of sight. A week later the letter actually shows up and you tear it up before they see it.
