Punxsutawney Phil, you over-hyped weather rat. You let us down. You dampened our spirits. You … ahhh, why do we care whether an over-sized groundhog sees his shadow any way? I shouldn’t blame poor Phillip. We’re smart people. We know better than to put our good faith in the hands of over-fed marmots. You know, I’ve heard groundhogs are also referred to as land-beavers or whistle-pigs, and you should never trust anything called a whistle-pig. But we want to believe. We want to think that the groundhog might just be able to dispose of this gloomy time of year. That time when even we bright and cheery Floridians — normally drenched in a cocktail of sun — start to doubt whether the shiny stuff will ever re-emerge. We wonder why we’ve been forsaken and yell out at the heavens: “We’re lookin’ like cave fish down here, oh Lord. Bring us back our rays!” When the clouds don’t break and worse, torture us with a tinkling of monotonous drizzle that has plagued us the past week, we turn to critters who look like they should lay off the carbs. Why? Because we want hope — to make a clean break with winter and get jiggy with spring. Remember spring? That time of year when wilted and frost-burned vegetation sparks back to life and drowns us in heaps of lung-choking pollen? Sure, we have to wear gas masks, but it’s bright, vibrant and green. The way Florida was meant to be. Shoot, we can … Continue reading The big weather rat and gloom-be-gone