Sorry not sorry, I love this weather. If you live in North America., you may have noticed a slight change in the temperature and precipitation across the continent as a large chunk of the polar vortex spun off and lurched drunkenly toward the equator like a bro at a frat party crashing toward the DJ station to loudly demand "Livin On a Prayer" for the umpteenth time (Jesus, there goes my metaphor...), changing a rainy, muddy winter into an instant Ice Age. Virtually everywhere in the lower 48 has been effected. The Deep South is in a deep freeze. Chicago is colder than most of Alaska. The roads are ice, the pipes are freezing, kids are being kept home from school simply because of the temperature. And I love it. It's a stark scene - the glaring, blinding white of the snow under a pale sun in a hard sky, making the shadows long and blue. The air is dry and shockingly cold; every breath is sharp in the throat, and the wind bites into my cheeks and wraps the cold around my
Pictured: about 60lbs of black walnut fruit. Yes, it's that dread time of year...the wind blows...the branches shake...suddenly there's a bump...bump bump...BANG! on the tender roof of your car! What are these divots? What are these round, green things lying everywhere? What are these...these dark stains on the concrete...? You look up. Towering above you is a gigantic, multi-armed, inhuman being, breathing through strange fronds, and in its tentacles you see its eggs, hundreds of them! Thousands of them! Raining down upon your property! You rush to get a rake, a shovel, an axe for God's sake...but it's too late! The lurid green orbs are piling up on the porch! Slamming against the screen door! They break through the glass, bounding like murderous tennis balls, and all you can do is let out one final, despairing SHRIEK...! Yeah they're black walnuts. Everyone I know who owns or rents hates black walnut trees, at least with the kind of bemusement that comes with t