So, I’m in the Big Orange Box Store getting a few things for the jobsite this morning. I’m busy running my credit card, since the stores make the customers do the work these days, when the clerk (I can’t bring myself to call her a cashier) asks me, “Do you think we’ll see sixty below this year?”

Without even looking up I reply, “Oh yeah. No doubt about it.”

When I had finished my role as cashier, I looked up and noticed that the woman’s chin was resting on her chest. I looked at her questioningly.

“How can you say that? What makes you think that?”

“It’s bound to happen, it’s shaping up to be a brutal winter. All the signs point to it.”

“What will we do?” She asked with obvious horror written across her facial expression complete with tics.

Now I was confused, all I thought was: What the hell does that mean: ‘What will we do’? “We’ll do what we always do; we’ll suffer through it, go through a bunch of fuel and get gleeful messages from so-called friends in the Lower 48 asking ‘How cold is it today’?”

“But do people go to work? Surely little children don’t go to school. Are businesses open? Will this store be open?”

I’m sure my expression clearly showed that I was thinking, ‘My god, this woman is nuts.’ But I asked, in what I thought was a rather kind & considerate tone, “Is this your first year here?”

“Our second.”

“I see. Everything is open. We go about our business as usual. Just make sure you vehicle is winterized and is running properly.”

“Oh, well we have a garage.”

“A heated garage?” I asked.

“Oh yes, of course.”

I could feel my eyes start to narrow. I could feel my jaw tighten. I could feel the hairs on the back of my neck stand straight out. My blood pressure suddenly rose. “You realize that any sympathy I may have felt for you has completely evaporated. Just deal with it like the rest of us.”

Cheechakos.