Cold

Notes on this week's weirdly fluctuating weather:
1. There's a sweet gum tree in my side yard, and the wind has blown off its seed pods complete with their stems. The yard looked like a snow cocktail full of prickly maraschino cherries.
2. Two friends have a long, steep driveway that turned into a luge track with Sunday's ice. They waited until noon to go out, giving the ice a chance to melt, but still the wife waited at the bottom of the driveway, cell phone in hand and ready to call emergency services, while her husband delicately negotiated the decline. All was well.
3. While most horses are shivering under their layers of blankets, one friend's horse is in ecstasy in the cold. His endurance triples, claims his proud owner, who describes him as half draft horse and half polar bear.