19 September 2006

Kitty-corner?!?!

Question: Is the term "kitty-corner" native to North Dakota or just a mid-western colloquialism?

If you need a definition, "kitty-corner" means nothing more, as far as I can tell, than adjacent to or across from. I must admit that I'm used to the phrase "catty-corner" so its not so much the definition that throws me off as much as the replacement of kitty for catty.

Why kitty?

18 September 2006

I'm cold...

Dear Friends, who do not live in what I like to affectionately call "the Frozen North."

So I've had people from North Dakota warn me that winter can begin as early as September, but I think in the back of my mind there was always a little doubt. Let me tell you with great certainty this morning that... they were NOT wrong.

Allow me to paint a picture for you. I'm sitting in my office, where it is currently around 64 degrees, patiently (okay maybe not patiently) waiting for the heater to begin to work its magic. I glance outside and feel a shiver go through my body because I can't believe people are actually strolling through this weather to class. Granted I would have never skipped class no matter what the weather, but I would definitely made it a priority to carry an umbrella and walk as fast as I possibly could up the hill to the History Department.


Before I left my apartment this morning, I flipped on the weather channel to see what the forecast was for the day. A "toasty" 48 degrees with scattered showers reads the scrolling local forecast at the bottom of the screen. My mind immediately calculates that the equivalent to this type of weather in Georgia and what I'm left with is a day in mid December or January. BURR... I also can not help, but think of the Are You Afraid of the Dark? episode in which the young boy haunts the place where he froze to death. "I'm cold," his blue lips repeated incessantly. And I sing silently to myself a line from a youth choir Christmas musical that I had a part in when I was in middle school.

It's cccc-cold outside and the temperature's diving.
And it looks a lot like winter is arriving.
I've got the shshsh-shivers and
I ccc-couldn't stop them if I tried.
I'm gonna shsh-shake, rattle, and roll.
It's ccc-cold outside.
Needless to say, this Georgia girl is excited and a little frightened to see where this weather may take her. Please send warm thoughts and pray for a more comfortable day tomorrow when I have to be outside all day for a student activity fair. Much love to all.

Longing for a Georgia breeze, Margaret