In the same way that the summers of my youth were much sunnier, the winters of my youth were much snowier. I remember the maternal admonishments as I tried to go outside without wrapping up. I remember the black wellies that were always the wrong size and the gloves that would always get soaking wet from the snowballs.

Our garden was quite large (about three acres) and there was a reasonable hill in the back field so we used to toboggan on it -- or try to. The most successful sled we made was an old wooden ladder with formica nailed to the bottom and a sheet of copper beaten around the front to make a curve. That thing moved. I was forever garroting myself on the wire fence at the bottom of the hill on that thing. One year there was a big freeze after heavy rainfall and the flooding at the bottom of the garden froze solid enough to walk on. Except that I didn't keep my balance and smacked my head badly going arse over tip.

In 1982 we had heavy (for Ireland) snow and I remember me and my dad maneuvering the car so I could get to school. It was skidding all over the place and I think dad just wanted to drive in the snow as I could easily have walked. Of course when I arrived at school, it was closed, so I had to walk home anyway. My grandmother died that year and the funeral was delayed a few days due to the weather.

We had snow in 2000 as well, it seems.

What I like most about snow is how quiet everything gets. The combination of the blanketing effect and the fact that less people are moving around deadens everything. And it's so clean looking (until the thaw, and then it's all about the slush, baby). I'm told that different places get different snow, but our snow is crunchy and crystalline and sticks together properly for snowmen. And it flies apart properly when it hits your opponent in a snowball fight. And it goes down the back of your neck. http://met.ie/ says we have had an average of 4.5 days of snow each year for the last thirty years (at Dublin airport, anyway). It really doesn't feel like it.

I'm hoping for snow.