Learn Hardcore Russian: Иногда погода удивляет меня зимой. - Sometimes the weather surprises me in winter.

In Russian, names of seasons often function as adverbs of time and take the instrumental case without a preposition. So зима → instrumental зимой, meaning “in winter.” You don’t say в зимой; you simply use зимой.

Why is меня in the accusative case instead of the dative?

The verb удивлять is a transitive (active) verb that answers the question “кого?” (whom?). Transitive verbs take a direct object in the accusative case. That’s why we have удивляет меня (“surprises me”) rather than a dative form.

Why is удивляет used instead of the reflexive удивляется?

Удивлять (+ Acc.) means “to surprise someone.” Удивляться (+ Dat.) means “to be surprised oneself.” Here the weather is doing the surprising, so we need the active verb удивлять with меня in the accusative.

Could we omit меня and say Иногда погода удивляет зимой?

No, because удивлять requires a direct object (кому/что?). Without меня, the sentence lacks its object and sounds incomplete. In very colloquial speech you might drop it if context is crystal-clear, but it’s not standard.