It's definitely half full

I had never stopped to wonder if the early-morning clerk at my neighborhood convenience store is a "glass half empty" kind of guy. But yesterday morning he provided a definitive answer.

It was still pitch-dark when I set out to pick up the Sunday papers. The thermometer outside the kitchen window read 6 below. Although I usually walk to the store, it was too cold even for me, so I stomped out to the Prius, pried open the frozen door, plopped myself behind the wheel and held my breath, hoping the car would start. (It did.)

The clerk and I have been going through this Sunday morning ritual for years now, so we always exchange pleasantries.

"How's it going?" he asked when I practically ran into the store.

"I don't know," I replied. "I'm too cold to tell."

"Well," he shot back, ignoring the frigid temperatures, the icy sidewalks, and the gloomy pre-dawn January darkness. "At least it isn't snowing!"