A Blast of Winter

Clearly I spoke too soon.  The cold winds and freezing temperatures of winter had only to read my last post to smack me upside the head with their presence.  Yesterday hit the low 30˚sF and we hauled out the heavy socks and mufflers and layers of sweaters and realized that people here wear hats for a reason, and it has little to do with fashion.  Well, maybe a little.

Today the forecast read 32˚F and, as www.weather.com helpfully tells you, it "feels like 24˚".  Yes, it does, can't argue with that.  And today I packed up my computer to take it over to the wi-fi-equipped café up the street because once again the internet and phone have crapped out, since Saturday.  This time Darty tells me in the morning that it's an electrical problem, just debrancher le cable and plug it back in 30 minutes later.  Right.

And when a French friend is nice enough to call them in the evening to make sure we're communicating, at least in terms of language, they tell her that no, in fact the whole street is having problems and it should be fixed within six days.  Six days! No internet, no phone, six days; does not compute (cheap pun not intentional, but hey...).

So I'm sitting wrapped in my layers in a sheltered corner of the glassed in terrace and thinking, hey, this isn't so bad.  Paris, sun, coffee, internet access, what more does a blogger need?  That's when I realized I could no longer feel my feet and my fingers were moving very stiffly.  Time to go back to the apartment.

I'm not complaining, it's just different.  I can never seem to imagine weather different from what I'm experiencing at the moment.  Packing for winter in August was a slapdash affair and I'm lucky I remembered all those things that are making it bearable for us now.  But I'm very happy I splurged on that cashmere muffler last month.  It's found its home around my neck.  And all that nagging I did to get  Gene to buy a winter coat?  He said thanks this morning.