My eldest (by one minute) son Benjamin likes to say “I love surprises” and I guess the kinds of surprises he and his brother receive — new toys — would be fun. But as I move north of 40 years old, I find that I like surprises less and less, because at my age surprises usually aren’t fun.

And the least enjoyable of all the things on the surprise landscape has been the crazy weather we’ve had for the last few months. Now, I love the Hoosier state, I was born here, my family has deep roots here (the Myerses moved to Daviess County in the 1830s), but the weather we’ve had this winter is for the birds.

I always look forward to fall and the cooler temperatures, but last fall the 90 temps seemed to stick around forever (I shouldn’t be able to wear shorts and a short sleeve shirt to a Hatchet football game in mid-October and still feel warm, but that was the case last season). The weather eventually cooled off but mostly mild temperatures stuck around until mid January, when winter finally arrived.

January is normally our big winter weather month, and February is kind of the beginning of the thaw. But, as our boys clamored for a return of the white stuff that’s so fun to play in (after a brief snowfall in December wet their appetite), January was a fairly uneventful month.

February, on the other hand, turned out to be just plain miserable. I’d never really been through a serious ice storm, but then we had two in a matter of two weeks, plus some snow. In fact, we hit the winter weather trifecta multiple times in February — sleet, freezing rain, and snow — often on the same day. I remember hearing one of the television weather guys say we had four consecutive weeks in February where we were threatened by winter weather.

Shoveling snow is one thing, but twice in February I had to scrape ice off my driveway, and both times there was so much ice that, after breaking it up, I had to push it aside with a big push broom, a process that took almost two hours each time. After the first time that happened, I went “Whew, I’m glad I won’t have to do that again” only to have to do it again a week later.

Of course, I’m not happy about the weather unless it’s exactly what it’s supposed to be, when it’s supposed to be. If it’s supposed to cool, then I want it cool. If it’s supposed to be winter, then I want winter. If it’s supposed to be summer, then I want summer. I don’t look to Mother Nature for surprises, just boring old normalcy.

All of which means I’m already working on my column for August — the one about where I complain about how I hate the hot, humid Indiana summer. I guess there’s just no pleasing this Hoosier.