Brrr ...

29 November - Today's weather report. It's going to be cold. It's going to be wet. And it's going to last the rest of your life.
Woke up this morning and looked out the window to see the whole street covered in white and what was worse was that it was getting whiter. My first Canadian snow since arrival ... The thrill of seeing it was slightly overwhelmed by the knowledge that I was going to be riding through it an hour later. Got as rugged up as possible, brought out the leggings and the nylon booties, put on my full fingered gloves and sported my toque (its just a hat) instead of my usual bandanna (underneath the helmet of course) and then tentatively headed out. I rode very slowly into town, partly to reduce the windchill which was considerable but also because I was a bit uncertain about the slickness of the roads. It eased off for a little while but shortly after i'd started work it started coming down in drifts, interspersed with the usual rain of course. I have to say that my head doesn't work so well in the rain - it's so distracting dealing with water getting into everything, not helped by the fact that the f**king leggings just wouldn't stay up - every time I was in a lift alone i'd be hiking them up underneath my knicks and I could constantly feel them slipping, when they did, i'd also feel the chill of exposed leg and there was the frustration of not being able to do anythingabout it until I got off my bike. Generally, they stayed on while I was riding but because I was constantly getting on and off, walking into buildings and pedalling, they just wouldn't stay up. Eventually I decided to brave the cold and just got rid of them. To do this meant removing my shoes and hence the booties and they take so long to put on properly that I didn't bother replacing them so by the end of the day my feet were soaked again. Still, a pretty busy day without too many mishaps. The streets were pretty slippery but nothing worse than a normal rainy day. One of the other couriers asked me if I was missingAustralia today. Of course I was. So am I, man, and i've never even been there!!!! That was one of the nice couriers - some of them ar the most miserable f**kers imaginable, but they're in the minority. To top it off my blackberry screen blanked out around quarter past four but it was pretty dead by that stage so it wasn't a disaster. Hopefully my replacement won't take too long to arrive tomorrow. Very happy to finish off today and get inside away from the snow - wwhich is still piled up all around the house (it doesn't last long in the city) and will probably be even thicker tomorrow because it's supposed to be snowing again tomorrow. Well, at least i'll be able to make a snowman.