Baby, It's Motherchuffing Cold Outside

Lord knows I am not a religious man, but JESUS CHRIST it is cold in New York.

Here was I recalling all those film scenes where couples skip jauntily down snow-covered sidewalks as jovial hot dog vendors look on with a bad-toothed grin and the smoke from a dirty cigar coils around him in his shirt and jacket...visions of Macaulay Culkin wandering around New York in nothing but a small red coat and a woolly hat...not to mention the fact that it snowed when I came to New York for the first time in March - and that wasn't so bad. Mind you, it melted pretty much the next day, and within a week Krissa and I, newly in love, were picnicking in t-shirts outside the Lincoln Center...

This isn't exactly how I had imagined. I had imagined snowy scenes along the lines of those in the UK - snow comes, it's a tit bit nipply out and all you have to do is wrap up a bit more and all is fine and dandy, dandy and fine.

I walked Krissa to the subway this morning, and now I'm beginning to think that it was a mistake coming back to the apartment to warm up, have a cup of tea and rethink my clothing strategy whilst waiting for the post before heading back out into the city.

Because I'm SCARED.

It started snowing last night at about eight thirty, as Krissa and I tumbled out of a bookshop on Union Square, and a very fine white powdery snow was swirling in the street lights. We were laughing and running through it, this first New York snow, and we grinned widely as four carollers in the subway station produced marvellous harmonies which resounded sweetly off the dirty tiled walls and fought for hearing with the movement of the trains. We smiled at the falling snow and drew shapes on parked cars on the way home from the subway and when we stole outside to play before going to bed.

This morning I pulled on two t-shirts, a wool jumper and my arctic-kick-ass coat. Jeans. The megaboots. Gloves and a beanie hat. With this rather complete ensemble, one would think survival was a bit of a given. In fact, come to think of it, the fact that I'm telling you about it makes my survival a bit of a given, but roll with me here.
Sitting in the comfort of our office as I am, listening to the sweltering Cuban melodies of Buena Vista Social Club and drinking tea, the following numbers strike an atheist's fear of God into me:

Temperatures for New York City, New York, 20th of December 2004:

13F or, with windchill (of which there is a fair bit about) -5F.

In modern money, that converts to

-10C or -25C with the windchill.

You can feel that -25 on your face when you step out and in the first thirty seconds you're all, 'Oooh, touch brisk this morning' then after that thirty seconds you're going numb, which is about as bad I've been in the UK, and you're all, 'Oh, right, really is a bit cold!' the next thirty seconds it feels as though the moisture embedded in your exposed skin is turning to ice and rupturing everything around it into the bargain, like pingos.

Pingos are mounds or hills formed by growing cells of ice under the ground in periglacial regions. The ice grows and grows under the surface until a hill is formed and all the earth on top and around is displaced and churned up. Like that, but in your face.

What is all this talk of pingos? Well there's a certain icy clarity of thought outside. A-Level Geography: 'Cold Environments' just came flooding back to me, in a face-freezing torrent of information. Along with it came the cold, terrible realisation of which global-scaled ocean flow I had unwittingly opted for this season...

This season, the United Kingdom and the Republic of Ireland have opted to sport the Gulf Stream. A warm, caressing current, this little beauty transports a monkeyload of thermal energy right across the Atlantic after it says goodbye to North America about halfway up the Eastern Seaboard, having been born in the Tropics and the Gulf of Mexico. A wise choice, some might say, for the Winter Fashion Season, the Gulf Stream is giving the British Isles a bit of a leg up in the temperature stakes, lending a mature and gravelly wet-grey aspect to this season's haute couture, which is offset rather nicely by the rich British Racing Green of the hedgerows, fields etc. A mild ensemble, but practical.

On the other side of the Atlantic and several degrees further south, we have the North East of the United States of America. This season the states of the North East are sporting something rather special in terms of oceanic accessories.
Now it might be seen as something of a faux pas in fashion circles - the all out mad dash for a certain look. All denim - not a good idea, just as the same applies to all-polka-dot, all-tartan ensembles and the like. But when done with panache and flair and a certain...I don't know what...things like the Labrador Current can really come off beautifully. Sliding grimly down between Northern Canada and the wastes of Greenland, the Labrador Current is bringing white...yes! White! ...and a hint of blue to the North East US. A bold, stark move in terms of look and feel, white is *in* this season!

Now I'm pretty much done with this post. It's cold. There's only so many ways you can say it, but there's something else I've got to say.

As children, our wonderful Mother was always concerned about Jemma and I in cold weather. There are, at the last count, over three hundred,"That's The Quickest Way To Catch A Cold" sayings on record. I have to say that there were more than a few occasions throughout my childhood when a brief cough and a bit of a temperature were played out for more time off school than they really warranted, and as a result Mum became very practical in terms of clothing, and this has been the lead for years of taking the mickey out of her for overconcern.

Whenever it's been a bit cold, or I've headed out for a summer's evening with friends in just a shirt, the old 'Are you sure you don't want a balaclava?' joke has been wheeled out, dripping in sarcasm.

Only now I think I might want one.