The BEST Thing About Snow ...

... is the snowball fights.

I work in an office park with like 30+ buildings. All of them are 3 stories high and they all have roof access. You can see picnic tables and umbrellas set up there for when the weather actually is decent. Until today, I never would have said that they're within snowball-range of one another. But guess what, they are!

As some co-workers and I were walking across the office park to and from the cafeteria, we all heard (and saw) a bunch of inter-roof snowball fights going on. We heard the yelling and the *thunk* *thunk* of snowballs splatting into the sides of building. So naturally, a bunch of co-workers and I joined in this time-honored tradition by gathering on the roof of our building and hucking snowballs at one another. The roof is split in two by a gap -- some developers gathered on one side and my group gathered on the other, and we flung away for like 20 minutes.

Then I noticed the people in the building next to us, who work for a different company, were out on their roof having their own mini-snowball fight. So I turned their way and fired a warning shot. Soon, the inter-office battle was joined. Unfortunately for the other company, they were not only outclassed but also outnumbered. It seems their co-workers were not as eager to fight as ours were :-) The other office mustered up a bit of offense, but I think it's clear whose side carried the day. Huzzah!!!

It was so much fun. No one really got hit, because, well, I guess because it's hard to wing a snowball accurately when you can't even feel your hands. Also, we all had big jackets on, and those somewhat limit the range of motion of your arms. But I did manage to land a couple good shots. And I didn't get hit. I also fell down a lot. And my shoes are soaked through.

So, all in all, it was your typical Saturday at the office.

Another interesting sight is the little snow-figures that have popped up all over the city. I saw at least a dozen of them around our office park, variously dressed with mittens and hats and such. (I feel for the humans who once wore them.) And also along the Shanghai S&TM metro plaza - there was a giant snow dog being walked by a tiny snow man. I WISH I had my camera. Maybe I'll bring it to the office with me tomorrow and take a lunchtime tour of the snow-office-park that our neighbors have created.