FullSizeRenderThis is February, right? According to my computicator (computer calculator, for those of you who don’t speak Dork) February 26th is a mere few days from the mathematical middle of winter . . . and yet Portland, weird already in its own right (a blogger’s paradise in that respect), could care less: I’m walking around NW Portland, minding my own business, and all of the trees around me are literally exploding with blooms and flowers and buds and other non-wintery tree-like emoticons! It’s hard not to cry out “Woo-hooo!” in the common tree dialect and dance a little Springity jig!

Okay . . . I’m getting those wary looks from my fellow pedestrians . . . again. I don’t want to talk about it.

Is the flora here really that happy? Or is it all the pot smoke in the parks getting sucked up by the . . . oh, there are no leaves yet, are there? I’ll call my scientist–they’re like lawyers . . . everyone should have a scientist on retainer–to study secondhand pot smoke in dogs, peeing happy juice on unwary trees.This discovery could have global significance, right?!

Hold on, I need to go clear a spot on my mantle for my Nobel prize! I mean, there has to be some scientific basis for the oddness in this town. I’d hate to think I’m the only sane one here.

I wouldn’t put it past Portlandians to run off to Pennsylvania, hijack Punxsutawney Phil and set him up in a hippy communal flat, complete with Barcalounger and full-spectrum lights, to ward off his Seasonal Affective Disorder. It’s not like we get many fear-worthy shadows here, with our cloudy winters. We’re practical that way. Or was it just weird. Oh, right . . . just weird.

Meanwhile, poor Winter is getting shooed out of Portland with nary a “better luck next year.” Or perhaps it got discouraged and wandered off on it’s own, hitchhiking its way to Montana where it can get some respect. “Come back when you can give us some snow!” cries Portland at its back, cackling insanely.

I might have imagined the cackling.

I just heard from my scientist, who seems bent on ruining my chances at a Nobel prize: she keeps asking me what I’m on and to stop pestering her until I give her some. It’s hard to get good help these days. =P