Getting Ready For New Hellos

You can set you watch to it. At 2 pm on December 26, the veil of sleep is lifted off the head of this town and the manic social pace so admired and envied wakes up hungry. Over-booked planes arrive all day, the causeways become clogged with beach-bound traffic, and gridlock on town streets develop. Pasty snowbirds start popping up at all the bars, their white skin ripe for the inevitable sunburn and (since it was in the 60's late yesterday afternoon) when Boris arrived with a ski jacket and cap he was met by our visitors in speedos. It is all great fun.

By Thursday a switch will be turned on and the formal parties begin. While their invitations may speak of honoring this person or that cause, if you read between the lines they all worship the weather. The weather is a fickle god; in September and October it punished this heathen town. But apparently enough virgins were found and sacrificed to appease the weather god because it is pay back time and that god is shining down on us. The madness has just begun, and we are eager to show that we survived to carry on.