Snow!

Snow is very rare in Memphis. During any given winter it will snow a handful of times; out of those times it may actually stick to the ground and be something you can go out and play in once or twice.

Thursday night they were predicting snow, and lots of its. Surprisingly, the forecast didn't change on Friday. "The temperature will drop Friday afternoon and then it will snow. A lot," the weather guys all said.

[Friday night, snug in our house, fire burning, I said to Sonya: "I like following winter weather much more than tropical weather. With snow it's all, 'how will the drive home be? Will I get a day off?' With hurricanes it's like, 'Do I need to leave town? Could the weather possibly kill me?'"]

So, at about one-thirty Friday afternoon, it started to snow. A lot. As advertised! Thick, wet, white snow that started to stick as soon as it hit the ground. I got sent home at two-fifteen. Sonya had already left. I went to the grocery store, she went to get the boy, and we met up at the house.

Then we went outside to play and make a snowman.

The snowman was wearing a Yankees cap, sunglasses and gay pride beads. He had insectile little weed-arms and an untrustworthy red bean smile. And a rake.

It was perfect snowman snow, too. As soon as I'd roll a little bit across the ground it would pick up every flake around it. Gigantic, car-crushing snow balls were possible.

In summary: I got off early and then got to play in the snow with my kid. When we came in, there was a fire burning. It was the greatest afternoon ever.