It's times like these that I miss Florida

I reluctantly got out of the shower tonight -- and only did so because the hot water was running out. As soon as the air hit my skin, I could feel my pores, every last one of them, tighten in pain. The kind of pain that forces hair follicles to try to flee by their roots, making shaving an exercise in futility.

Tonight I tried something different: cranking my furnace to 70 before my shower. I think that made it worse. Back down to 68.

The outside temp is 13. My skin is like sandpaper, my fingertips are split open, and my hair feels like straw. I have deadly icicles dangling from my roof, a dog that hasn't pooped in days because the snow burns her paws. I'm wondering if my car will start in the morning after discovering the poor thing vomited oil all over the garage floor. My Jetta is, after all, a Florida baby like Zoe. It prefers sea salt to rock salt.

In trying to get over this winter, I've come up with a top-10 list of why I should stop dreaming of Florida:

10. Warm, bulky clothing hides my warm, bulky body.

9. I have not seen a palmetto bug in my toilet for more than three years.

8. Scarves as fashion accessories.

7. Kids dig sleds.

6. Snow-shoveling is great exercise.

5. No wondering where that lizard went after it crawled under the armoire.

4. I can actually get out of the shower and dry off, as opposed to going from damp to sweaty.

3. The mail is prompt. No more waiting three months for packages to arrive.

2. I'm totally used to sock rings now. And my sandals get time to air out.

1. Who needs sand castles when you have snow angels??

HELLO TAMPA

The girls love the Steelers. When they're not bickering over bingo.

HERE WE GO, STEELERS!!!

Break in the clouds

I was putzing around the house tonight after shoveling the driveway when I noticed... there was something... different.


There was SUN!


After all the doom and gloom the past week, seeing temperatures I can't ever remember seeing before, it was wonderful seeing a little light.


I didn't know my little 10-dollar gizmo could even register such insane temps. I'll have to find one that stops at zero so I can continue to live in denial.

Date night

We had a night out for grownups, joined later by Rob and Jenny. Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhh.

Like a good neighbor...

I went outside after work and shoveled snow. It was peaceful and quiet. And I wondered why the rest of my neighbors weren't digging out from under the day's snowfall.


I guess I should check the forecast more often. It has been coming down so hard in the three hours since I shoveled that it looks as though I didn't touch my driveway, minus some small bare spots where apparently I spilled enough salt.

I don't get this snow thing. Isn't it too cold to snow??? ISN'T 20 DEGREES TOO COLD FOR ANYTHING?

Anyway, my neighbors are apparently onto the fact that no amount of shoveling and salt was going to have any effect by morning. I need to catch on to these things. Like when they don't water in the summer because of impending torrential downpours (and I'm out there with my hose) and when they don't put garbage out (and I'm out the next morning dragging shit back into the garage wondering why garbage men get freakin' Grandparents' Day off).

My $7 a week habit

But if the deer keep devouring it, the birds may fall prey to the economy.

If I had my way...

There would be refrigerated purses. And I would buy one for my cheese.

Complete disbelief

Liam tries for the 115th time to beat me at Scrabble:


He is one persistent man. While he was struggling with, errrr, thinking about his next moves, I was rummaging through his CD collection to import onto my laptop.

When I got to the end of his CD case, I found this:


I. AM. SPEECHLESS.