As regular Zoners know, we have been toasting and roasting the arrival of each new season. We last hailed the autumnal equinox (“The Four Seasons, Part 3: Autumn Falls at Our Feet,” September 23, 2013). The series finally reaches its end (praise be!) with this fourth and final installment. So once again we fire up the Joe Zone nuclear-powered microscope, and objectively examine the hated season of winter, that abysmal time of year when death would be welcome relief, and you feel yourself curling up like one of the dry, lifeless leaves shriveling and shivering on your lawn, under six inches of ice.
Of course, winter isn’t all bad. Some people actually like winter, and in fact look forward to it. They enjoy the cold, the snow, the lack of light, the misery, the depression, the soul-sucking numbness that winter brings. Scientific study has shown that many of these people are on hallucinogens.