A Cold Day In Hell

I walked to work in the snow today. It was nice.

People like snow, but they hate rain. Maybe it's because it's colder.

It's the same reason people like ice-cream, but hate milk. And love Finland but hate Portugal.

Everyone loves their freezer. Most households keep the freezer in the middle of the living room, decorated by laurel wreaths and glitter. The oven, on the other hand, is distrusted. Most people keep their ovens wrapped in brown paper and barbed wire, only using it if absolutely necessary.

The most popular soup in this country is gazpacho. If I'm in a restaurant and someone has the temerity to offer me hot soup, I usually throw it in the face of the waiter. Sometimes being scalded is the only way to learn.

Athletes competing in the Winter Olympics are venerated as Gods. The charlatans claiming to represent us in the "summer games" are rightly spat at in the street.

To give someone the cold shoulder is a gesture of affection, whereas a warm smile is a sign of disdain.

If someone I know has a cold, I'll embrace them (perhaps licking the mucus off their face). If they have a fever, I take them outside and shoot them like a racehorse. (The racehorse being the shootee rather than the shooter. Hooves and all that.)

People love David Frost, Jon Snow, and Vanilla Ice, but hate Stephen Fry, Peter Cook and Robert Burns.

***

There's not really anywhere this can lead, is there? I mean, if I was building to a punchline or something, it might be worth it. But I'm not. It has been a waste of my time and yours.

There can be no satisfying ending. A weak pun? A reference to this discussion being 'cool'? It's just not worth it.

The idea didn't have any legs to begin with (like a worm), and yet still managed to go downhill (like a skiing worm).

Maybe I should just delete it. I could get rid of it and you'd all be none the wiser. Of course I'd have to get rid of this sentence too.

Or, I could leave this bit, but delete the beginning. People would wonder what it was about. It might become legend: "the great lost rubbish entry". There could be discussions on the internet, scholarly conferences, wild speculations - all desperate to discover this lost gem.

The anticipation would have built to a fever pitch. It would be like JD Salinger writing a new Harry Potter book, and reading it aloud in Atlantis.

And then, one day, I'd release it into the world.

The disappointment would be palpable.

I'd be hounded out of public life. Not that I'm in public life at the moment. But I would be by then.

I'd be hounded out of public life, but the anger would be such that I was hounded out of private life. I'd try to seek refuge, but I'd be constantly hounded (sometimes with real hounds).

Hounded out of the high life, hounded out of Second Life, hounded out of the afterlife, hounded out of my past lives, hounded out of public life again, hounded out of pubic life, hounded out of pubic lice, hounded out of That's Life!

I'd be hounded out of each second of my life, into the next second (luckily at a rate of one hounding per second, so it wouldn't have much effect).

Hounds would have to be specially bred. Vast hound farms would be erected. The hound industry would require all of the world's resources. Robot hounds would be created, but would rebel against the pointlessness of the enterprise, and would be fought in a Terminator-style post-apocalyptic warzone.

Hell on Earth. But with hounds.

All things considered, I'd better post the above stupid hot/cold thing, for the good of humanity.

And what about a pun to finish with?

To be honest, considering the grave consequences, I don't think this is a time for wordplay.