Above the arctic line, the winter was so cold it never snowed. Not until spring, after it had warmed to the early teens and twenties in the spring. The snow stayed packed on the roadways in neat white ribbons boardered by sometimes 6 foot walls of packed snow. Any new accumulations creaked underfoot like tennies on a gym floor.
Tatiana Ivanevna's family and I had spent an evening in Iscatily (sp?) with Natasha Ivanevna, Tatiana's sister. There had been food and dancing and far too much vodka and wine; all to help celebrate Natasha's birthday. We were headed home via bus but waited half an hour in the cold for the bus. Glittering snowflakes swirled in the air and on the snowpack. In the distance I heard a lone cricket chirping away...
It was a full five minutes before I realized that there was no way that the sound I was hearing could possibly have been a cricket. If puppies froze into hockey-pucks out there on the ice, how could a cricket possibly survive? I looked around and discovered my cricket was actually a huge snow paver, it's exhaust valve sqeaking open with a cricketlike chirp.
This morning I was awakened by Provo public works plowing the 4-5 inches of snow off the street. I love flavorful weather.
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