COLUMN: Frigid weather fosters nippy conversation
I don’t know about you, but my feet haven’t been dry in several weeks.
True Logan winter is back. We have been spoiled for a couple years and only had winter cold that freezes our ears. Sadly, we’ve reverted back to the reputable frigidness that freezes our ears, eyes, mouth, neck, shins, brain, soul, sternocleidomastoids, high-risk checking account and our broad variety of cheese-based baked goods.
Luckily for us, the anxiety-inducing freeze has left us for a time, giving ample room to present snow at our door steps. White stuff here, white stuff there, white stuff everywhere. It’s like living on the surface of the world’s largest morsel of frosted shredded wheat. The student center resembles a ski-resort lodge from an inside-out glance, and public campus areas such as the library have become more of a refuge than an institution of scholastic endeavor.
This atmospheric change is exactly what brought me to the library earlier this week.
Surviving the freeze is definitely the hot topic on the town, and in time when media-darling, soon-to-be NFL superstars are getting caught up with fake girlfriends you have to admit the trending topic is very impressive.
Take the library-dwelling friends I call the “Snowgirls.” Snowgirl One and Snowgirl Two are just inside the refuge, scarves still in tow, and are beginning to exchange pleasantries. It doesn’t take long before they spat off about the cold. These females could comment on how to survive the cold, car problems, illness or favorite flavors of cocoa. But where do the Snowgirls take the conversation? Where anyone in this setting would take it: into social competition.
The subject at hand: whose off-campus apartment complex parking lot had the worse plow performance?
Let the debate begin.
Snowgirl One starts off strong by noting the slush count in her parking lot. In her words, it was like wading through a soda slurpee.
Snowgirl Two then takes the offense with an ever trusty, “Oh, that’s nothing,” and snapping her hand for an overhead salute so sudden she seemed to be referring to a beyond-sturdy shelf.
Snowgirl One, aghast at the attempt to take over the conversation from the get-go, flops entirely, only chiming in with a “that’s crazy” and leaving room for Snowgirl Two to add insult to injury by claiming she didn’t have heating at her apartment. This war may be over as soon as it started.
But wait – Snowgirl One springs to life. Two male-type humanoids had to push her out of her parking spot this morning. According to her claims, one of the guys she didn’t know and the other had a class with her a while back.
Snowgirl Two, in no mood to concede that easily, tells a tale of how her car battery once died in the middle of a snow storm, forcing her to take bus while hauling, in her words, “Like, three grocery bags and a gallon of milk.”
Snowgirl One says she knows someone who had their car die in Salt Lake City over the weekend. The reference to a friend is, of course, a well-planned misdirection to make Snowgirl Two believe she is talking about herself while still appearing humble. She defends herself, snapping, “At least Salt Lake isn’t that bad. It could be worse.”
They move on to talk about memes for a bit as it seems this battle has reached a standstill. Ah, yes – sudden death it is.
Both seem to struggle for a bar to grab to find leverage in this conversation and both fall to no avail, until finally, by some ability greater than human power itself, Snowgirl Two digs in deep and finds the dagger.
She sighs and says she’d better go. She doesn’t want to walk to class because she wore her Toms.
Game, set and match. Snowgirl One can only marvel in the act of leaving boots in the bedroom but still finding the wherewithal to hoof it with integrity.
She can only nod, note that they need to have another movie night sometime and tip her hat to the victor. A battle well-fought indeed.
– Steve Schwartzman is a senior in communication studies and linguistics. When he isn’t trying too hard to make people laugh he is usually watching sports, watching 90’s cartoons or experiencing all things Aggie Life. Got a good idea for Steve to rant about? Hit him up at steve.schwartzman@aggiemail.usu.edu or on Twitter @SchwartZteve