STRANGER THAN FICTION: THERE'S NO BUSINESS LIKE SNOW BUSINESS: GOOD OR BAD

Who in their right minds would miss shoveling snow, scraping ice and losing feeling in their extremities?

The Other Half has snow fever. Bad.

I blame The Weather Channel's hourly updates about snow across Nebraska, Maryland and dear ol' Cape Girardeau.

There actually are smudges on the television where Mr. Half's been pressing his nose to the glass, watching those shivering reporters in their damp jackets. They've discussed the size and wetness of the flakes, made snowballs to illustrate the density, measured the drifts. And Mr. Half has been there for nearly every field report.

If it weren't for college basketball, he'd never change the channel.

This recent behavior, along with a multitude of other things, leads me to question his sanity. Apparently, he doesn't remember the snow-related tragedies of life outside Florida.

1. In 1989, when I lived in greater metropolitan Piedmont, I had to be to work at a country-and-western radio station (10 watts of pure stereo power) by 5 a.m. There is absolutely no feeling in the world worse than rising at 4 a.m. and determining that you'll have to remove a foot of snow from your vehicle before driving 30 miles of iced-over mountain roads to a minimum-wage job.

2. I had to walk to and from work in Sikeston in early 1994 after our tires froze to the asphalt in front of the home I shared with Mr. Half. And, since we parked on the street, the city snowplows left us the gifts of drifts alongside our cars.

Mr. Half also had his only auto accident during the same weather event. He drives like every other Missouri native during a snowstorm -- refusing to compensate for the changed road conditions.

3. The 90-degree slope of our Cape Girardeau driveway prevented parking near our apartment door during icy weather in the winters of 1995 and 1996. Instead, we parked at the bottom of the driveway and had to literally crawl to our door. It was like living the IMAX movie "Everest," except the heroes of that film had food rations and pickaxes.

Not that we were completely left to fend for ourselves. The landlord left a five-pound bag of rock salt on our doorstep every November. Of course, five pounds of salt doesn't go too far on a 60-foot-long driveway.

Mr. Half only remembers good snow-related times, which ended at our high-school graduations. Those were the days -- getting up at 6 a.m., tuning into AM radio and promising the Lord that you'd never be mean to your little sister again if only he'd make the DJ say the words "Sikeston Public Schools."

At our house, we always celebrated by eating a little breakfast, pulling on our snow boots and heavy coats and walking to school. I think the sight of the empty building on a weekday titillated us.

Now that I'm an adult and there's no such thing as a snow day, I'm content to live in Florida, where I've traded in my snow shovel and ice scraper for an extra-large bottle of Algae-B-Gone mold remover and a contract with a local exterminator. He's promised me that he'll either rid our home of palmetto bugs or at least train them to do amusing tricks.

But Mr. Half needs a reminder of what snow is really like. I think I'll douse him with freezing water, hand him a shovel, send him to the beach and tell him to move 500 pounds of wet sand from Point A to Point B.

Heidi Nieland is a staff writer for the Southeast Missourian who now lives in Pensacola, Fla.