WOW IT FEELS LIKE SPRING!

ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED BY THE SOMERS RECORD (03-31-22)- Please remember small business in your town during this coronavirus pandemic

     Yes, it feels like spring, but IS it? We've had a lot of bait-and-switch regarding spring this year. We get a 70-degree day, I put away my winter coat and gloves, and BOOM, like Lucy jerking the football away from Charlie Brown's foot, it's gone again. Crocuses are unreliable. They're so eager, they'd come up in January if they thought they would be adored. And like that guy who talks REALLY low and REALLY fast at the end of a car sales ad to give you a dose of bad news after you got your hopes up, there's more rain at the end of the rainbow.

     March is supposed to come "in like a lion" and go "out like a lamb." But with the vagaries of climate change the whole month is being lionized like never before. It's like someone fed March a raw carcass at the end February and we're suffering from the bitter aftertaste. It's more like a wolf in sheep's clothing (okay now I'll stop).

     But I hear that this time spring is finally here, and do you know who I heard it from? Frogs. Frogs never lie, and they're croaking away in the pond out there, trying to attract a mate. And yet, they're all saying the SAME DAMN THING. If I was trying to impress a member of the opposite sex (and these days it's harder to tell which ones are opposite) I would try to distinguish myself using wit and guile. For instance, my cat said something the other day that made me lean closer and really listen. She opened her mouth and meowed but nothing came out, and I have to say I was intrigued. I mouthed the words, "What?" with no sound and she did it again. This went on for longer than you'd expect, but at least we had a conversation. Who knows where it might lead? Try to stand out from the pack if you want to put a little spring in your spring.

     My wife says it's really spring this time because woodpeckers are out pecking in the morning. I understand there are times when you feel like you're banging your head against the wall, but to do it ON PURPOSE so fast that you're essentially playing 64th notes with your face doesn't seem like a well-thought-out plan to me. Why don't they pull the worms out of the ground like everybody else? If the thought just never occurred to them then they are not on the evolutionary fast track.

     I work in television, and I can tell it's spring because the programs that were "America's Most Talked-About New Shows" in the fall have disappeared and not one American has talked about it. Another sign that the season has changed is the initiation of Daylight Savings Time. This is where we set the clocks ahead, I lose an hour of sleep and two sets of tennis the next day. Why is Daylight Savings Time wasting my time in the middle of the night instead of during the day? Why not set the clocks ahead one hour just when "Fox and Friends" is about to start?

     There is legislation afoot to make Daylight Savings Time a permanent thing, which means that I'll permanently lose two sets of tennis. Why not move the clocks ahead four hours so that it's still light out at midnight and I can get a suntan under the cover of darkness?

     I for one am happy to thaw out because during the winter I can never get the temperature of my house exactly the way I want it, like I can in my car. There always seem to be pockets of cold weather in various places that you wouldn't expect, and in other places it's cozy warm. If I had that little dial that I have in my Dodge Dart that's half red and half blue, I bet I could get it just right. And while we're at it I'd also like those buttons that point the heat either at my face or at my feet, or both.

     My friend Paul hates spring because to him it means summer is on the way. But if that's the case he should love summer because it means fall is on the way. I'm all in favor of the warm weather, I don't have to put on shoes, my coffee doesn't get cold in the car, and people at the beach look so much better without a down parka. You may love it and you may not but spring is finally here, just ask a frog. And while you're at it, give him a little kiss. You never know- you might get yourself a handsome prince, although most female frogs would tell you that this method is hit or miss, at best.