shadows of echoes of memories of songs

Okay, look, it's not that I don't like snow. I like the look of it, I don't mind the cold (I wore my big thick fur coat today, though in retrospect something more waterproof might have been sensible), I'm not even going to attempt to drive in it, and I'm lucky enough to live in an area where the buses are still running (and to have the use of my legs).

However -- and this is where you get to call me a killjoy -- I do not want snowballs thrown at me. It is not "fun"; it is cold, soggy, occasionally painful, and generally quite unpleasant. Yes, I probably didn't mind it so much when I was a small child, when school was cancelled and I could prance about in the snow all morning and then go inside and have a big mug of hot ribena. But I'm not a small child now, I'm a grouchy adult who does not relish the thought of having to sit in work all afternoon wearing clothes which have been soaked with icy water. Also, they don't sell splashsuits in adult sizes. Or if they do, I guess I just don't go to those kind of shops...

So instead I've devised a warmer form of entertainment for other fun-haters. It has the same element of hit-or-miss about it, and all the fun of targetting people who aren't actually playing the game, but none of the cold-and-wet-ness, unless you sit in the freezer and play it, in which case frankly that's not my problem. Fellow curmudgeons, I bring you: ( snow bingo )

I don't like being tickled, either. I mean, I know everybody says that, because they secretly actually want to be tickled, but I really really don't like it, not in a "don't throw me in that there briar patch" way, but in a "quite likely to punch you, actually" way. Just sayin'.