Shades of Gray

Hello. This is The Daily Bone and I’m your lively doggie reporter Chester L. W. Spaniel. 

When I first heard there was a book and a movie called “Fifty Shades of Gray,” I thought it would be all about Western New York in March! Indeed, during this time of year we have unrelenting gray clouds, melting snow drifts, compacted gray ice underfoot, and gray grunge tracked into the house.

We use rock salt to melt the ice on the roads. (If you look at the snowplow pictures from yesterday, you'll see it's loaded with a ton of salt!) This salt is not the kind you can put on your curvaceous cucumber or on the scintillating edge of your trembling margarita glass. It’s full of dirt and grit. When you drive on roads that are wet with melting slush, this mess gets splattered liberally onto your car. You can even taste the salt in the air when you breathe in sharply. Pretty soon everything fades to gray.

My ghostwriter took a little drive around the shopping malls and plazas today to take a few pictures of the dreary grayness which we are have to endure for the entire month of March.

Here’s a classic parking lot mountain, complete with a shopping cart, like a cherry, perched on top, and the muscular machine that constructed this towering mound. As you can see, there is very little color in this photograph besides gray. The monotony can get a bit agonizing, and one cannot help but crave release from winter’s bondage!

Take a look at these silly mall geese! For some reason, this group decided to stick it out here for the winter. It must be torture sitting there in that cold wind! (Hey, I have a nice warm spot for them in our big deep freezer!) I’ll bet they’re going to give their travel agent a good spanking when she gets back from her Carribean cruise!

Here’s the bottom of our driveway with Dad’s snow shovel for reference. Again, gray, gray, gray!

Dad has been laboring mightily, with aching muscles, and sweaty brow to clear the heavy layers of ice and snow to reveal the slick blackness of pavement below. You know, the weatherman promised us warmer temperatures for this week, and maybe even a thaw. Alas, the high temperature today was 16º! It’s not very nice to promise things like that! You too shall be punished for getting our hopes up!

We could show you endless photos of the oppressive grayness in our shivering region, but we’re going to make you wait for the sequel. Will I give you a hint? NO WAY!