(1) I go out for a day of sledding, alone, while it's still snowing and I know no one else would be out. All I have to wear at the time is skateboard-shoes. I start heading back when my feet are numbing badly. It's snowing fiercely. What starts as knee-high snow slowly grows as high as my thighs as I trek through it. Unknown to me at the time, snow clings to corduroy pants, which I'm wearing. I start to feel cold water on each leg.
Suddenly, as I'm walking, I fall about 3 feet deeper into an unrecognized snowdrift. In a slight panic, I toss my sled aside, and try to climb out of the hole. I'm able to get mostly out, but the heel of one of my shoes doesn't want to come with me. I stay halfway out, with one leg in the hole trying to pull out the shoe with the toe of my foot. Instead, each attempt only opens up the heel of the shoe to have snow blown into it, and each successive attempt packs it down and chills my foot more. Finally I realize I have to abandon the shoe.
I climb out triumphant, with one foot only dressed in a single soaking wet sock. I hobble home like some kind of snow pirate.
(2) I wake up, with only enough time to ride my bike to school, which I do daily. There is frost on the entire lawn(a poor-mans thermometor; I estimate it's 25 degrees or so), so I suit up accordingly. 2 pairs of sock-style convienience store gloves, cloaked in leather gardening gloves. A thick woolen hat, 1 T-shirt, 1 waffle-print style long sleeve shirt, and a corduroy overshirt. corduroy pants over waffle-print "long johns", 2 pairs of thick socks and hi top basketball shoes.
Nevertheless, After climbing up the first hill on my bike, my fingers were frozen instantaneously. My exposed face... hurt. I pinched my lips together so they didn't crack or possibly bleed. As I rode, faster and faster, the chill in my wrists began to climb up my arms like someone pulled the blood out of them with a blood magnet. My toes became numb, and slowly my mid-foot in the same fashion. I finally made it to school, this being the only time I was glad to be there, and noticed that there were only 2 cars in the parking lot and class should be starting... now.
Assuming the obvious but not wanting to believe it at this very moment, I rode up to the door. "closed due to inclimate weather" is what the piece of paper hung up with sotch tape said, by an overworked janitor excited to leave. I looked at the trees. The branches were still as could be. I looked up. The sky was blue and clear. Nothing was stirring, not even an angry kid on a bmx bike. I thought of a warm house, breakfast, and daytime talk shows and took off. All of my sensations continued on the way home, with the addition of frozen ears(within my woolen hat) and drying eyes as I went down hills, feeling like Ice water was running across their surfaces.
When I got inside, I felt my hands and feet thaw out. It was like an N64 rumble-pak was malfuntioning inside of my palms, and the battery acid was boiling inside of that. I turned on the news, it still being the only thing on this early. I looked about 2 or 3 times back and forth from the time to the screen. 8:20, 8 degrees. 8. Meaning a half an hour ago it was likely 7. It took my last finger and toes and astounding hour and a half to become fully warm again.
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