For the conspiracy theorists

For many years now a rather strange thing has happened with haunting regularity right outside of the place where I work. An alley runs immediately alongside our shop, and every time it rains a circle of about five feet in diameter dries out, in the exact same place, well ahead of the the remainder of the alleyway.

When it snows, the snow will melt faster, sometimes quite amazingly fast. So fast that there will still be several inches of powder running smack up to the circle, leaving the edge of the snow with the appearance something like surface tension on an almost overfilled glass. Consequently, in the winter we often have the unusual sight of perfectly dry cement on extremely cold days.

I have long wondered about that spot. I would love to know what causes it; is it caused by some alien object buried along ago, unnoticed until the alley was run over it about 100 years back? Are there rays from the sun who have decided it was their duty to keep the circle dry and safe for all its life? Might there be some supernatural explanation? Could I have, right outside my own back door, the equivalent of the mysterious crop circles which appear around the globe?

I don't believe any of that, not for a minute. There has to be some perfectly natural reason for the regular appearance of the dry spot in the alley. Perhaps there are electric lines under it, although I can't imagine electric lines creating enough heat outside of a problem we would have found by now. There certainly cannot be heating ducts there, can there? If they ever rip out the cement, I would dearly love to be there to see what the might find in the dirt below. The bottom line is, there must be a rational explanation for it, right? But that wouldn't be much fun, would it? Would it?

Conspiracy theorists, I may just have something for you.