Haiku for the week

Watch the weathervane:
When the wind blows from the north,
You must cower at home.

I usually think of myself as a pretty hardy fellow, but 15 or more degrees of windchill will cut through anything - even the cashmere sweater and the longjohns I try to reserve for my occasional trips to the far north, the frozen Siberian wilderness of Heilongjiang.  Background temperatures have remained fairly constant for the last couple of weeks, and not really too severe for the time of year: -10⁰C or so overnight, and pushing up towards 0⁰C during the day.  So, it's been fine - sometimes really rather pleasant - to venture out when the wind drops.  But when it comes howling down off the Mongolian steppes, it becomes unappealing even to undertake the 5 minute walk to the local shops; and I realise I am going to face yet another evening camped on the sofa with my DVD collection.  Such is the winter in Beijing.  We should be nearly over the hump of it, though: December and the first half of January are the period of severest cold; it's usually starting to get significantly milder again before the middle of February.