Hats off to winter!

Shoveling out from this past snowfall, I took a trip down memory lane. Fortunately, I didn't have to shovel that, too.

Whenever my grandfather would come up to Alaska to visit us in the winter, he would always get on my case about going outside without a hat on. "75% of body heat escapes through the top of your head," he would say. "You'll catch pneumonia."

This was the only time he would not seem notice my thick mass of long hair.

I sported quite the mullet in those days. My nose was my hairstyle landmark; if my hair reached the tip of my nose it was time for a haircut. I would have them cut it back up to the top of my nose and then use that as a guide how short(?) to trim the rest - except for the back, of course. My hair was so thick that they had to go back over again with the thinning scissors. At the end of the cut, I left enough hair on the floor that I could walk out the door without stepping on a single tile.

Grandpa would always notice my hair when we were indoors or when it was warm outside. Especially when I had the long hair in the back pulled into a tail. Boy, howdy, did he ever notice it then.

When you think about it, a hat is really just a pile of hair clippings that's been reassembled in a new way. What Grandpa never realized while we were standing out in the Alaska cold is that I was already wearing a hat.

Apart from the obvious age thing, my grandfather and I had some notable differences. He exercised for an hour every morning, I considered eating potato chips a hobby; he was always up doing something while I was always sitting around doing nothing. My hair color was brown, his was freckled with some age spots, except for a few gray patches where the hair actually protruded out from the skin.

Grandpa had good reason to wear hats; he had almost no body fat and very little hair. I, on the other hand, had plenty of thermal protection all over my body. Blubber has great insulation properties, which is one of the reasons you'll never see a walrus in a parka. On top of that, I had a mop-top mullet that was rated to -23 degrees.

Grandpa never seemed to get that for us bigger folk, letting body heat escape is a good thing. Some of us break a sweat from eating. Frigid air comes as quite a relief - especially when you don't have to find a restaurant with a walk-in freezer to get it.

I did finally cut my hair short before moving to the East Coast. Not coincidentally, nowadays I do keep hats around and use hoods as well. Grandpa would be proud.

Sort of.

See, while my past-times involve much less caloric intake, I am still a big guy. As such, I still do not adhere to Grandpa's standards for body-heat retention. I can only imagine what he'd say about me outside during a blizzard shoveling snow in shorts.

It's partly the Alaskan in me, but more so all the cheeseburgers and pizza in me.

Goo, goo, goo joob.