h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

We don't get them very often in Austin, and when we do they don't last very long (it'll be summer again two days from now with temps in the 70s), but they do happen.

I went out with some friends last night. It was already below freezing when we left at 7pm, and there was either sleet or freezing rain falling. I suspect it was the latter because when we came out of the bar around 11.30 there was a film of ice all over the car which necessitated some scraping of windscreens and windows. Then there's that period of about five minutes where you're sitting inside a cold car, shivering and waiting for the engine to warm up and start pushing hot water through the heater. Ah, memories

This morning the ice is still on the cars and other such surfaces (minimum temperature last night was 26F/-3.3C), augmented by a light dusting of snow.

It's on days such as this, when all school, college and university classes have been cancelled for the day and government offices and services closed, and a few people in the private sector have no doubt also taken a weather day, that I'm particularly pleased not to be working at the Drafthouse any more. Because so many of the people who are unable to get to work because of the weather apparently don't have the same difficulty getting to the cinema, and show up in large numbers. And that influx wasn't allowed for when the schedule was written, earlier in the week. And it's Friday - delivery day.

It feels so very good not to have to deal with that any more. I'm staying indoors today and baking bread

Not only a scraping of windscreens last night, but also a scraping of hard butter this morning, and a delicate spreading of same so as not to tear great holes in the bread.

Did you warm your knife up

I've never found a warm knife to work that well - the butter keeps slipping off it

It is a delicate art, it has to be said

You could always defrost your butter by frying it,pop your bread in same pan, hey presto, buttery bread

I'm guessing that people can get to the cinema because you don't actually get that much snow and by the afternoon the roads are clear and they can get out and about again?

Here we don't get much in the way of snow, it usually lasts a couple of weeks in a normal winter. On the first day it's a pain in the behind, but after that everyone gets into a routine (getting up earlier to sweep the pavements, de-ice the car etc)

Apparently it's illegal here to drive around with a big pile of snow on the roof of your car (presumably because it can slide around and end up on the windscreen of the car behind you blinding them).

And one thing I'm not missing by now commuting by train is the great sheets of really thick ice falling off the tops of lorries in front of me and scaring me half to death.

That used to scare the out of me too when I was driving on the motorway behind a lorry in the winter months. And I reckon you're right about the snow on top of a car.

On the first point, I'm having vivid flashbacks to a Tuesday five or six years ago when it was icy and/or snowy all day long, and our first film was at 11am because it was Baby Day - a day when parents can bring in their babies and they won't be asked to leave if the baby starts crying, unless the little... blighter is screaming the place down. The rule applies for the first two rounds of films, at 11am/noon and 1pm/2pm.

The hoards arrived in small numbers for the first round, and in droves for the second, by which time managers were frantically trying to call in extra bartenders, servers, kitchen staff, food runners.

Fridays have also always had an 11am start because it's the day films are released, and Monday, Wednesday and Thursday would be either a 1pm or 4pm start, but nowadays the first film is at 11am every day, so there's plenty of scope for people off work because of a snow day to come in.

Mind you if I had a snow day and could get to see a film I probably would, since it comes out of my annual leave

Which is why I say I'm "working from home" ...

Driving with a build up of snow on the roof is illegal here, too. There's no specific law against it, but it comes under a lot of other ones, like driving a vehicle in an unsafe condition etc. Of course, that doesn't stop people just scraping a slit on the windscreen to look through, hopping in, and driving off.

There hasn't been much snow here this winter. Perhaps I should say "yet" - it was late March before we got the really heavy stuff last year.

Another cold day with schools and offices closed. Maybe I should go and see a film

*feels a bit guilty*

There was a mild draught here last week.

Don't feel bad - although it's going to be even colder tonight than last night, by Thursday we'll be in the mid 60s, then the mid 70s on Friday with night-time lows close to 60

In other words almost 40°F warmer during the day than it was today, and more than 30°F warmer than it'll be tonight