The Winter from Hell

It's come to this — blogging about the weather.

A front-page article in the Spectator the other day had the headline "'Winter from hell' far from over, folks". That morning we got 15 cm of snow, and today (Friday) and tomorrow we're supposed to get another 10-30 cm. We've already gotten more snow than we did all of last winter, I've worked at home because of weather more times this year than any other year (there were a couple of weeks in early February where I worked at home for about 8 out of 10 consecutive days), the potholes on the roads are brutal, and the four of us decided this morning that we've all had quite enough of winter, thankyouverymuch.

This year more than any other year I can remember, I have wondered to myself "Why do I still live in the cold, snowy, slushy Great White North? Why have I not moved to Vancouver or Florida or California or Hawaii or someplace warm?" The standard answer is that southern Ontario is where I've lived pretty much all my life (other than 4 months in Seattle and a year and a half in Ottawa). Most of my friends and family are here, and it'd be hard to make it to Rock, Leafs, and Blue Jays games if I lived anywhere else. I suppose the short answer is that I love southern Ontario... except for the winters.

I've been to Vancouver, and I loved it. It's a beautiful city. Moving there would have the advantage of staying in Canada, but the winters are much nicer than here. It would also have the advantage of being close to the mountains — not only are they beautiful, but you could pick a spring day where it's 15 degrees at home, drive for two hours and go skiing. I have friends in San Jose as well, and moving there would give us a zillion opportunities for tech jobs (not that we don't have that here). However, both of those cities are very expensive, and to get a house the size of ours in either of those places (that's not 100 miles away from the city) would be a million dollars, and <checking wallet> I don't have a million dollars.

So I guess we'll just hang out here and complain about the winters until we retire, at which point we can spend our winters in Florida with thousands of other Canadian retirees. Maybe once the kids are in university Gail and I can winter in Florida and telecommute — Sybase might build me a GraemeAnywhere! (Note that the picture of IvanAnywhere in that article is old — here's a newer one. If you look down the hall in that picture, you'll see the top of a doorway on the left. My office is two doors down from that one.) (Update: IvanAnywhere has his own page on sybase.com now!)

Anyone else notice the irony in the phrase "winter from hell"?