A few years ago when my daughter Claire was working in Leon, Nicaragua, I went down there to visit her. Every day while she worked I took an immersion class in Spanish taught by Zorayda, a friendly, lovely Nicaraguan girl.

The next day during my class I told Zorayda about our trip to the beach and I asked her why people didn't swim. Don't Nicaraguans like the water?
She looked a little surprised that I'd asked. "It's the middle of winter. Nobody swims in the winter."
Not wanting to sound like an ignorant American I just nodded and said, "Oh" instead of shreiking, "Middle of winter? It's 94 flippin' degrees here! I could swim in my own sweat!"
But later that day when I told Claire what Zorayda had said I did, in fact shriek , "Middle of winter? It's 94 flippin' degrees here!"
Claire chuckled. "But in the middle of summer it'll be a hundred and four degrees here!"
So, anyway, I guess we all feel some discontent in our winter, however that winter may be. But it does beg the question: would you rather have a minus 13 degree winter or a 94 degree winter?
