Whilst this musing is not pertinent to the meteorological expressions seen today, it is a matter of some note that it has hailed no fewer than four times since November. This is an occasion of wonder to me, as I was full ten years of age before I ever saw hail, and one cannot expect hail more than once a year in this spot with any sobriety. And yet the hail falls, the irked percussion of the clouds! The graduate students and scientists skitter to and fro with unseemly haste and previously non-cranial attire worn like bizaare millinery.

Why now? Why do the hails so pelt upon the Beaver State? What dastardly force calls forth the icy wrath? Is it the end of days? What unseen hand plucks ice from the very clouds to heap upon us?