1. Holidays. Why are they all in the winter? Thanksgiving, Christmas, New Years, Valentines Day, St. Patrick's Day... it's just too much. I've expressed my rather dire feelings about holidays in general before, so it should come as no surprise that I feel clusters of them are uncalled for. Lucky, the worst is already behind us.
2. Forms. FAFSA, W-4, W-2, Taxes... federal shenanaganizing. Askeroscarooscarfug. (Congrats if you came up with some way to pronounce that.)
3. Snow. *sighs* Alright. I confess. I hate snow, but not really. It's complicated. Just when I think it's bearable and maybe even kind of pretty, it proves me wrong and gets in my boot or tries to trip me up or just generally interferes with the delicate task of living my life.
4. Darkness. I like the dark. It's fine. But the long dark mornings and nights make me want to sleep in and go to bed earlier, and me wanting to go to bed at 5 P.M. is rather annoying and counter-productive.
5. Cold. I loathe being cold. More than being hot, more than being sweaty, more than losing a toe to a shark. Okay, maybe not the last one. Being cold makes me feel like I'm about 100 years old and lacking the appropriate medication for my various conditions that are causing me this aching pain. Dire? Yes. They aren't your joints, so deal with it. (For the record, if they are your joints too, I express my sincerest sympathy and the offer to get together to have a warm beverage and discuss our unnamed condition.)
I know I complain rather a lot. I guess it's because it's the one thing I can do about the things I can do nothing about. And for some reason, complaining about things in a vaguely amusing thing somehow helps me to feel better about them. Go figure, eh?
Showing posts with label winter. Show all posts
Showing posts with label winter. Show all posts
Friday, January 27, 2012
Thursday, November 24, 2011
What Girls and Guys on My Campus Are Wearing -Winter Edition!
1. North Face. UGH. Do these come in any color other than ugly? If they aren't boring black, they are this hideous fuchsia. I know they must be warm... but seriously? Everyone, guys and girls alike. They're seriously not that flattering.
2. Uggs. Double ugh. I loathe these boots. They are so ugly and when they get ratty and nasty... I literally cringe at the sight. Again, I understand the importance of warmth and utility, I really do. But this is uncalled for. Swear by their unsurpassed comfort all you like, but I will never, ever wear a pair.
3. Mittens. Love these. Particularly the ones that have the fingerless gloves and then the mitten part folds over. So cute and perfect for texting.
4. Tights. Sadly these are all too rare, but I feel like giving the select stylin' few their due.Very nice, ladies. I'm impressed. And jealous.
5. Pea coats. I particularly love the brightly colored ones! The pink, teal and mustard ones were my favorites. I had to stop myself from staring. There is one guy on campus who has a lovely gray pea coat and let me tell you- that kid looks sharp. Take notes, boys. Nothing is more swoon worthy than a man in a nicely cut coat. Except maybe a man in a good hat...
6. Muckluks. Okay. I don't know why, but these are so much cuter than Uggs. I hesitate to call them stylish, but I don't violently loathe them or feel vaguely nauseated when I see them.
7. Scarves. There are not words that can express my affection for, devotion to and adoration of the scarf. The cuteness is so intense it's painful. At least once or twice a day, I see someone wearing one I am positively enamored with. I regularly steal my roommate scarves because she has a lovely collection she never wears. Feminine, smexy and warm. What more can we ask for?
8. Hoodies. I have a complex relationship with the hooded sweatshirt. I feel it is a reprehensible article of clothing that much of the undergraduate population uses to get away with not caring. Yet I must admit they are warm and, in some cases, appropriate. But when you use them as gym wear, your outfit for class and your coat... I just feel like you're limiting yourself. And failing to flatter any curves you might have.
9. Sweatpants. I own one pair and that is too many. Wear them with a hoodie and you just look sad. Like the poster child for despair. "I've given up on any fabric that isn't cotton. My depression is too deep for even denim." I really don't mean to sound like a total and absolute snob. Wear them if you like. You might even by some miracle look half way decent in them. You are free to wear them and I am free to despise them and feel sorry for anyone wearing them, much less that poor smuck I see wanting campus all too often wearing the North Face, a hoodie, sweatpants and Uggs. That's just too much sin for any man or woman to carry around on their person.
10. Trapper Hats. Which always make me think of Kingsley. Which is an excellent connotation. Plus, it's the fake fur trend which somehow looks so fab on everyone else but I have no desire to adopt it myself. Meh. It happens.
2. Uggs. Double ugh. I loathe these boots. They are so ugly and when they get ratty and nasty... I literally cringe at the sight. Again, I understand the importance of warmth and utility, I really do. But this is uncalled for. Swear by their unsurpassed comfort all you like, but I will never, ever wear a pair.
3. Mittens. Love these. Particularly the ones that have the fingerless gloves and then the mitten part folds over. So cute and perfect for texting.
4. Tights. Sadly these are all too rare, but I feel like giving the select stylin' few their due.Very nice, ladies. I'm impressed. And jealous.
5. Pea coats. I particularly love the brightly colored ones! The pink, teal and mustard ones were my favorites. I had to stop myself from staring. There is one guy on campus who has a lovely gray pea coat and let me tell you- that kid looks sharp. Take notes, boys. Nothing is more swoon worthy than a man in a nicely cut coat. Except maybe a man in a good hat...
6. Muckluks. Okay. I don't know why, but these are so much cuter than Uggs. I hesitate to call them stylish, but I don't violently loathe them or feel vaguely nauseated when I see them.
7. Scarves. There are not words that can express my affection for, devotion to and adoration of the scarf. The cuteness is so intense it's painful. At least once or twice a day, I see someone wearing one I am positively enamored with. I regularly steal my roommate scarves because she has a lovely collection she never wears. Feminine, smexy and warm. What more can we ask for?
8. Hoodies. I have a complex relationship with the hooded sweatshirt. I feel it is a reprehensible article of clothing that much of the undergraduate population uses to get away with not caring. Yet I must admit they are warm and, in some cases, appropriate. But when you use them as gym wear, your outfit for class and your coat... I just feel like you're limiting yourself. And failing to flatter any curves you might have.
9. Sweatpants. I own one pair and that is too many. Wear them with a hoodie and you just look sad. Like the poster child for despair. "I've given up on any fabric that isn't cotton. My depression is too deep for even denim." I really don't mean to sound like a total and absolute snob. Wear them if you like. You might even by some miracle look half way decent in them. You are free to wear them and I am free to despise them and feel sorry for anyone wearing them, much less that poor smuck I see wanting campus all too often wearing the North Face, a hoodie, sweatpants and Uggs. That's just too much sin for any man or woman to carry around on their person.
10. Trapper Hats. Which always make me think of Kingsley. Which is an excellent connotation. Plus, it's the fake fur trend which somehow looks so fab on everyone else but I have no desire to adopt it myself. Meh. It happens.
Monday, January 3, 2011
Circles In The Sun
I love the sun. It is beautiful, bright and it keeps the world I'm living on alive.
I need light. I need warmth.
I love the sun in the Summer and the Spring (I love tans,) but I think I love it most in the Winter. I am allowed the luxury of taking the sunshine for granted during those warmer months, but in the Winter, the sun is not always there.The contrast is sharper. Absence makes the heart grow fonder, presence makes your love stronger.
The presence of the sun today certainly strengthened my already burning love.
I walked a lot during the summer with my dog but since the cold came, the road has been abandoned for the couch.
Today I walked circles in the sun.
Two things I have missed, returned.
It was lovely.
But I concluded that I just want Summer back.
One day, one season at a time.
Thankful for a day of sun.
Waiting for seasons to come.
I need light. I need warmth.
I love the sun in the Summer and the Spring (I love tans,) but I think I love it most in the Winter. I am allowed the luxury of taking the sunshine for granted during those warmer months, but in the Winter, the sun is not always there.The contrast is sharper. Absence makes the heart grow fonder, presence makes your love stronger.
The presence of the sun today certainly strengthened my already burning love.
I walked a lot during the summer with my dog but since the cold came, the road has been abandoned for the couch.
Today I walked circles in the sun.
Two things I have missed, returned.
It was lovely.
But I concluded that I just want Summer back.
One day, one season at a time.
Thankful for a day of sun.
Waiting for seasons to come.
Saturday, October 9, 2010
Sickly Sweet Childhood Memories
The following is one of, if not my all time, favorite childhood memories.
My younger sister, Clare and I, were outside playing on one of those winter days where it is warm and sunny, even though there is a good several inch layer of snow on the ground. On this particular day, we were getting along pretty well. Which, for us, meant only trying to assassinate the other once or twice.
We squabbled famously until this year. I finally broke down and matured, I guess. She's my closest sibling, as we are a little over a year apart. When this story takes place, I believe we are about ten and nine, respectively, perhaps a little younger.
Any way, on this lovely winter day, we happened to venture out by the gravel road of our rural home and lo and behold! A half emptied bottle of Pepsi- all alone and unguarded, just waiting for two lucky kids like us! We were thrilled to find that this bottle of the ever coveted carbonated treat was still two thirds full, and after some deliberation, we decided the benefits of free soda far outweighed the risks of someone elses backwash.
On a normal day, we would have fought like cats and dogs over the soda, causing such a stir that my Mother would have come outside to see what all the fuss was about and confiscated our prize. However, the stars were in harmonious alignment that day, and we agreed to share it equally.
We were going over the nitty gritty details of how to split the soda properly when suddenly, inspiration struck. I don't recall whose idea this was, or if this was our intent from the very beginning, but we decided that the same good and kid-loving gods who had sent us this soda had also bestowed upon us a surplus of snow with which to mix it. (Slushies!!)
This presented the problem of how to blend the slushies. We weren't stupid, and we knew revealing our secret would result in either less slushie per person, or no slushie at all depending on who found us first, a sibling or a parent. Thus, we acted with great resourcefulness and efficiency in our covert operation, procuring an old dog dish (yes, it gets grosser) to hold the goods (which I declared, with older sisterly superiority, to be quite sanitary after sitting in a freezing snow bank. Germs freeze to death. Duh.)
Then we found some clean(ish) snow to put into the dog dish and then we poured our precious Pepsi on top. Finding a stick (which was also the very picture of sanitation after we picked most of the bark off of it), we stirred the slushie in song. Seriously. We made up a slushie song. Heck if I know how it went, but I distinctly remember singing. And stirring.
We used sticks to scoop the first spoo...I mean stickfuls into our mouths. We agreed that it was excellent and congratulated each other on our genius. It was then decided that such genius should be applied further and that the fruits of it's labor should be named.
We decided to call it, with the sweet, senseless logic of children, A C Cola, short for 'Anna and Clare's Cola' This was obviously the thing to call a snow saturated Pepsi product. It was perfect.
And so, we ate and made merry and declared it one of the best things we had ever eaten. (I'm not gonna lie, it was pretty darn good.) And dispite our twisted sanitation efforts, we both survived.
I love that memory... I know ya'll think I'm revolting, that's okay, it's true. But that memory so captures what I remember of being a kid. Freedom. Creativity. Simplicity. Innocence. Sure, in theory we knew it was gross to drink someone elses soda, that dog mouths are not clean and neither is what birds put on snow. So what? We did it anyway. And we loved it. We thought it was perfect.
And so, it was.
My younger sister, Clare and I, were outside playing on one of those winter days where it is warm and sunny, even though there is a good several inch layer of snow on the ground. On this particular day, we were getting along pretty well. Which, for us, meant only trying to assassinate the other once or twice.
We squabbled famously until this year. I finally broke down and matured, I guess. She's my closest sibling, as we are a little over a year apart. When this story takes place, I believe we are about ten and nine, respectively, perhaps a little younger.
Any way, on this lovely winter day, we happened to venture out by the gravel road of our rural home and lo and behold! A half emptied bottle of Pepsi- all alone and unguarded, just waiting for two lucky kids like us! We were thrilled to find that this bottle of the ever coveted carbonated treat was still two thirds full, and after some deliberation, we decided the benefits of free soda far outweighed the risks of someone elses backwash.
On a normal day, we would have fought like cats and dogs over the soda, causing such a stir that my Mother would have come outside to see what all the fuss was about and confiscated our prize. However, the stars were in harmonious alignment that day, and we agreed to share it equally.
We were going over the nitty gritty details of how to split the soda properly when suddenly, inspiration struck. I don't recall whose idea this was, or if this was our intent from the very beginning, but we decided that the same good and kid-loving gods who had sent us this soda had also bestowed upon us a surplus of snow with which to mix it. (Slushies!!)
This presented the problem of how to blend the slushies. We weren't stupid, and we knew revealing our secret would result in either less slushie per person, or no slushie at all depending on who found us first, a sibling or a parent. Thus, we acted with great resourcefulness and efficiency in our covert operation, procuring an old dog dish (yes, it gets grosser) to hold the goods (which I declared, with older sisterly superiority, to be quite sanitary after sitting in a freezing snow bank. Germs freeze to death. Duh.)
Then we found some clean(ish) snow to put into the dog dish and then we poured our precious Pepsi on top. Finding a stick (which was also the very picture of sanitation after we picked most of the bark off of it), we stirred the slushie in song. Seriously. We made up a slushie song. Heck if I know how it went, but I distinctly remember singing. And stirring.
We used sticks to scoop the first spoo...I mean stickfuls into our mouths. We agreed that it was excellent and congratulated each other on our genius. It was then decided that such genius should be applied further and that the fruits of it's labor should be named.
We decided to call it, with the sweet, senseless logic of children, A C Cola, short for 'Anna and Clare's Cola' This was obviously the thing to call a snow saturated Pepsi product. It was perfect.
And so, we ate and made merry and declared it one of the best things we had ever eaten. (I'm not gonna lie, it was pretty darn good.) And dispite our twisted sanitation efforts, we both survived.
I love that memory... I know ya'll think I'm revolting, that's okay, it's true. But that memory so captures what I remember of being a kid. Freedom. Creativity. Simplicity. Innocence. Sure, in theory we knew it was gross to drink someone elses soda, that dog mouths are not clean and neither is what birds put on snow. So what? We did it anyway. And we loved it. We thought it was perfect.
And so, it was.
Friday, October 8, 2010
Hibernation: Phase One
After the temperature drops below sixty degrees, it starts. My semi-hibernation.
I am a pretty cold person, actually. This is actually recent, but as I've gotten older, I am cold a lot of the time. Not like disproportionally with the weather, I'm not wearing a sweater in July, but come October? Yeah. I'm wearing a sweater. And shoes with socks. Which is just wonderful living in the Midwest. And to add to the fun, I live in an old farmhouse. With leaky windows. Yeah. It gets cold. Once January hits, I'm pretty much in full blown hibernation. My adaption of hibernation is not nearly as good as the real thing, but human beings don't seem to get away with naps that last more than a day, much less ones that stretch over a whole season. So I do what I can (besides wishing I was a bear) to keep somewhat warm and sane during the colder months of the year.
Phase one of the hibernation: I drink like seven cups of something hot every day.
It begins with a nice cup of coffee. Oh, glorious coffee! I don't have a set way I 'take' my coffee, as it were. Sometimes I like it black. Sometimes with just a little milk. And sometimes I go cream and sugar. It depends on the mood.
Then, I have a mid morning cup of green tea. I love green tea. So, so good. It's got spunk. Don't tell me it doesn't taste like anything, because it does and I like it. You can enhance this with honey if you're feeling healthy or sugar if you just can't live without it. Most often, I go for the latter.
Then comes my three o'clock(ish) cup of oolong. Another splendid tea. It's a bit like black and green tea blended as far as flavor in my opinion. This needs sugar. Period. This is the one tea I interchange. I must have green in the morning! I must!! But this afternoon cup of tea sometimes becomes afternoon cups of tea and so I'll start with oolong, move on to apple cinnamon and finish off with a nice cup of gingerbread, depending on how adequately stocked the tea cupboard is and what I'm in the mood for.
Last but not least is the bed time cup. In the dead of winter, this is very important. This is the cup that needs to get you through that awful moment where you jump into you bed and shiver as you try desperately to circulate body heat... brrrrr.... It's almost (and I said almost) as bad as that moment getting out of bed. No. Forget it. I lied. It's not even close. It's only getting into the fifties at night here and I have two blankets and a comforter (folded in half) on my bed. My sister asks what I'm going to do when it's really cold.
Drink more tea. And find more blankets. And wear more clothes. It's all part of the grand hibernation that keeps me alive during these cold and cruel winters.
We're only in phase one right now. And goodness, you have to love tea. I hope you love coffee as well, because it is quite fabulous also.
I've just finished my cup of coffee. They say it will be in the seventies today, but if not, you can bet I'll be drinking a nice cup of green tea in a few hours.
Maybe I'll drink it anyway... it's good stuff, you know.
I am a pretty cold person, actually. This is actually recent, but as I've gotten older, I am cold a lot of the time. Not like disproportionally with the weather, I'm not wearing a sweater in July, but come October? Yeah. I'm wearing a sweater. And shoes with socks. Which is just wonderful living in the Midwest. And to add to the fun, I live in an old farmhouse. With leaky windows. Yeah. It gets cold. Once January hits, I'm pretty much in full blown hibernation. My adaption of hibernation is not nearly as good as the real thing, but human beings don't seem to get away with naps that last more than a day, much less ones that stretch over a whole season. So I do what I can (besides wishing I was a bear) to keep somewhat warm and sane during the colder months of the year.
Phase one of the hibernation: I drink like seven cups of something hot every day.
It begins with a nice cup of coffee. Oh, glorious coffee! I don't have a set way I 'take' my coffee, as it were. Sometimes I like it black. Sometimes with just a little milk. And sometimes I go cream and sugar. It depends on the mood.
Then, I have a mid morning cup of green tea. I love green tea. So, so good. It's got spunk. Don't tell me it doesn't taste like anything, because it does and I like it. You can enhance this with honey if you're feeling healthy or sugar if you just can't live without it. Most often, I go for the latter.
Then comes my three o'clock(ish) cup of oolong. Another splendid tea. It's a bit like black and green tea blended as far as flavor in my opinion. This needs sugar. Period. This is the one tea I interchange. I must have green in the morning! I must!! But this afternoon cup of tea sometimes becomes afternoon cups of tea and so I'll start with oolong, move on to apple cinnamon and finish off with a nice cup of gingerbread, depending on how adequately stocked the tea cupboard is and what I'm in the mood for.
Last but not least is the bed time cup. In the dead of winter, this is very important. This is the cup that needs to get you through that awful moment where you jump into you bed and shiver as you try desperately to circulate body heat... brrrrr.... It's almost (and I said almost) as bad as that moment getting out of bed. No. Forget it. I lied. It's not even close. It's only getting into the fifties at night here and I have two blankets and a comforter (folded in half) on my bed. My sister asks what I'm going to do when it's really cold.
Drink more tea. And find more blankets. And wear more clothes. It's all part of the grand hibernation that keeps me alive during these cold and cruel winters.
We're only in phase one right now. And goodness, you have to love tea. I hope you love coffee as well, because it is quite fabulous also.
I've just finished my cup of coffee. They say it will be in the seventies today, but if not, you can bet I'll be drinking a nice cup of green tea in a few hours.
Maybe I'll drink it anyway... it's good stuff, you know.
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