2003-01-21 - 4:31 p.m.

On the internal soundtrack: "Hold Me Now", Thompson Twins

Well. It is cold. It is FUCKING cold. I have about HAD it with the cold.

Do you know, it has been SO cold, that when I went outside yesterday morning at 8:30 and it was 32 degrees, it felt BALMY? I could NOT believe it. It's back to a high of 25 today.

Last year this time it was almost 50 degrees. *cries*

There is one good thing about all this: A couple weeks ago, I bought myself a full-length down coat with a hood. And since then, I have not shivered when I am outside. I go for my walks every day and it's not painful. My face gets a little chilly, but that's about it. This is nothing short of miraculous.

I had hoped to find an artificial fill that has the same effect as down (trapping warm air), because I didn't really need any goose guilt on top of my cow guilt. Even though supposedly down comes from chicken and geese that are being used for food anyway. Either way, I couldn't seem to find a Thinsulate or Thermolite coat that was full length, and a coat that only went to mid-thigh wasn't going to keep me warm.

So, every time I go outside in that coat I thank the birds who died to keep me warm. And if I take good care of it, hopefully I won't have to buy another one for a very, very long time, if ever.

Random notes:

After looking in all the conventional grocery stores, I finally went for a hike to a couple of health food stores and found myself some freakin' tangelos. I don't know why they're so hard to find. Although the Honeybells I got last year had a bad season and they're out of them already. Maybe that's it.

GROSSNESS ALERT: I read Samhamm's post about Albert puking, so I asked Poindexter when the last time was that he puked. It was when he was working in Portland with a bunch of guys from Ireland and they took him out drinking and peer pressured him into drinking too much. Last time I puked was food poisoning in Oberlin, Ohio 9.5 years ago. KNOCK WOOD.

My mom spent the afternoon with her godson. He completely ignored all his toys and played "Where are you?" the whole time, wherein he hid behind a chair and my mom said, "Where are you?" When he wasn't doing this, he was tripping the doorstop to hear it make noise. Toys on children are almost a total waste, I think. ALL of my fondest childhood memories are of games we made up. I think I'm going to quit buying gifts -- maybe one small token gift -- and give their parents money for college. Lord knows the kids have enough toys coming from grandparents and such.

This journal entry doesn't want to be written. Another day, then.

Gratuitous photo of the day:

Now you get to see what I was REALLY feeling like at the wedding!

I laugh every time I look at this picture. I was so nervous and stressed out. I had not yet fully recovered from my anxiety problems in Fishkill, for starters, partly because we had moved twice in less than a year (I needed a lot of stability to recover completely). And I never wanted a wedding in the first place. I wanted to run down to city hall, get the paper, and go home, or perhaps pick up the dry cleaning on the way back. I don't like planning parties, I don't like spending so much money on something that's over in a few hours, I don't like having to make all those nitpicky decisions, and I don't like being the center of attention for an entire afternoon. So almost everything involved with this wedding was a nightmare for me.

In short, I only did it because it made my parents REALLY HAPPY.

And I did love my dress, which was my mother's. That kind of brocade cannot be obtained today without forking over a LOT of money. I only had to pay about $400 to have it cleaned and altered.

Anyway, back then, when I was nervous and felt queasy I couldn't eat. (I've since learned to just eat anyway, thank god.) So those two hotdogs -- an appetizer I *insisted* on having -- went uneaten. I'm sitting there trying to will up the ability to eat them, and failing.

After the wedding, when I could relax, we went to our honeymoon suite and got takeout from the inn's wonderful restaurant, and I ate and ate and ate until I was stuffed. Boy did that feel good. And I've gained eight pounds since the wedding, which you can probably see looking at recent pictures. No more scarecrow.

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