When we turned blue

I am starting to get really, really worried about global warming.

It started -- much like the Internet! -- with Al Gore, when I saw An Inconvenient Truth this summer. Instantly I regretted every positive thing I had ever off-handedly uttered about climate change (you know, like when it's unseasonably warm out and you're like, "Sweet, global warming is awesome!"). Then the seasons changed. But in name only. Because it's January 4 on the calendar, but here in NYC it's a balmy 52 degrees. It's supposed to get up to 62 on Saturday (January 5!). I think in both the cities I've lived in so far this winter, it's dipped below 45 degrees during the day maybe twice. We haven't seen a single snowflake in New York -- not one -- which hasn't happened since 1878.

Meanwhile, everyone is in denial, or at least they are in Newsday: "It's wonderful to walk out into the garden without a coat and see the trees in bloom, the insects buzzing about and other flowers blossoming months early," said Mark Tebbitt, a horticultural taxonomist at the Brooklyn Botanic Garden.

Well, Mr. Tebbitt, as a horticultural taxonomist you should know that it's bad for plants to bloom this early in the season. (Isn't it? I'm sure I heard that somewhere.)

Newsday also calls the unseasonably warm weather a "welcome blessing for joggers," but I'm a jogger and I call it "a welcome reason to forgive Al Gore for being a stiff and instead get 100% behind him and his wacky theories of climate change." I bought a winter jacket today for $15. Clearly the people at the mall know something the rest of us don't: that it's never going to be cold again. (Cue ominous music.)