Cool

The weather is certainly cooler, about -6C outside, although the office is like an ice box after the sun passes by the window in the afternoon. This morning at ten, walking to work through the ger district in the warm sunlight was quite pleasurable. There was a congregation of drivers gathering by a small bridge while somebody swept the roadway. I tightrope walked across a steel beam of another small bridge which has lost its timber boards, probably for someone's fire. I passed small groups going towards the town centre and some school children, although no one was queued at the community water tank today. Two men sat on a south facing bank sharing a glass of vodka and I passed silently.

Approaching the roadside of the larger sealed road, I noticed a dog in my peripheral vision. I then realised its outstretched legs were frozen solid and that the corpse had probably been removed from the highway. Turning the corner, a family of five sharing the benchseat of a lorry moved their household surmounted by folded ger and window dome, as a woman beside the driver read a mobile phone message.