I love Arizona in wintertime.
Except when it’s miserable, like lately.
We rarely see snow except from a distance – and even that happens once in a blue moon. Last week, Mother Nature apparently forgot she was in Arizona. There was snow in Scottsdale a few days ago, and the highway was closed from Superior to Show Low. That’s a stretch of highway about 111 miles long. Show Low sits at an elevation over 6000 feet, so it’s not unusual for Snowmageddon to hit there. Superior is low desert, spitting distance from where we live. There’s a narrow canyon beyond, which ultimately leads to to Globe and Miami, Arizona. They get snow a little more often than Phoenix – but it’s still not an every-year occurrence. Maybe once every ten years.
It’s been near or below freezing here for close to two weeks now, which is also uncommon. We have a day or two occasionally where the nights drop below freezing, but not a week and certainly not two weeks. It was 45ºF at just shy of 2pm one day last week, in the Phoenix metro area. Again, not unprecedented to hit those numbers, but atypical to stay there for any period of time.
If your day involved shoveling snow, you’re welcome to glare and swear at me. I grew up near the Minnesota border, so yes I do know the difference.
Our heat-tolerant, drought-tolerant baby moringa trees aren’t cold-tolerant. They’re collectively drooping like Trump after a busy weekend with Stormy Daniels. Here’s hoping the sturdiest ones survive. (The trees. not Twitterer-in-chief and his peccadilloes.)
The trees aren’t the only thing intolerant of cold. My body has been kicking my ass lately. A few years ago my hands gave me an extra measure of grief. This year my $%&*^ ribs ache. This is on top of the usual “hurts-everywhere” special effects which arrive every winter like clockwork. And while I dealt with a short bout of the sniffles, I didn’t have a vicious cough to drop-kick me in the ribs, so not sure why they’ve decided to give me so much grief this year. Add that to my asthma and it’s been fun, in a “serial-killer-on-the-loose” kind of way.
Getting old ain’t for sissies.
It’s doubly tough because I’ve got so much work to do. The publishing house – such as it is – is on the cusp of going live. I had four books to format and have a series of eight books for which I need to create covers.
I haven’t forgotten you, Terri. I just haven’t had two minutes straight to catch my breath. A whole lotta deadlines hitting at once.
I feel for ya, kid. I really do. For all of it.
Thank God it’s supposed to warm up this week to mid-60’s daytime, and only into the 40’s overnight. That extra 20 degrees both ways was murdering my body.
Sorry you are suffering with the winter blues…..I can relate to that. So far, our winter has been extremely mild which just tells me that Look Out for March….
Don’t worry about my books….I have plenty to keep me busy.