Here Comes the Sun (and dirty water...)

The past few days have been (mostly) sunny, thank Jesus. I was just about to give up hope on Spring.

I got so happy about temps being in the 30+ range that I took off for a walk yesterday evening. Once I made it out of the skating rink that is our building's parking lot, I was enjoying myself so much that I decided to head to my sister's house. According to Google Maps, this is a 37-minute walk of 1.9 miles. Yeah. Google Maps didn't know about the patches of ice still lining most of sidewalks.

I'm a pretty brisk walker. I've done the route to my sister's house in 25 minutes, through 3 traffic crossings. In the summer. On dry ground. (Okay, one time it took me an hour and forty minutes, but that's because I stopped off at Walmart and browsed.) Yesterday, I barely made it as far as Walmart. That took me twenty minutes. Google clocks that at 0.8 miles from my apartment. (I might have shaved off some time when I hit a slick spot and slid about thirty feet. Craziness.) I called my nephew from the Garden Center at Wally's and had him pick me up. I got a lot of exercise in the car by clenching my jaw when he talked about how ice-free the road was.

This morning, after breakfast, I looked out my window and thought, "Hmm... Sunny again. YES!" Then I checked the temps and saw that it was about 17 degrees out. Alaska is never sunnier than on an ass-cold day. About half an hour ago, Weatherbug was showing the temp at 33 degrees. I stood at the window, debating with myself about taking another walk. Two minutes into that, a car went past, splashing ice water on a pedestrian.

Since I'm not walking today, I'm planning on getting all my exercise by laughing at old "Frasier" episodes on Netflix. I'm serious. I read that, by laughing for 15 minutes, I can burn 50 calories a day. Shoot.... My life is nothing if not pure comedy. I should be whip-thin by now.  By the way, if you want to have some fun, check out the interactive tool at WebMD (requires Flash, so I didn't use it).

I love this list of calorie burners. I looked at a few of the items and stopped at "drinking coffee", which is my favorite sport. I just wonder why, with all the java I throw back, I'm not eating to put weight on. Come to think of it, my mother used to say that worrying was a calorie burner. Although I almost never doubted a word coming out of my mama's mouth, I have to disagree with that theory. I am a world-class worrier. I worry so much, I even worry that I'm not worrying about something. My sister likes to tell me that I can worry the stink out of shit. I'm not sure if she and I are talking along the same lines, but... ~shrug~

Anyway, since it's too muddy and wet out to go walking, I'm going to go chew some gum. Better yet, I need to find some caffeinated gum.

Peace
--Free

Weather-Bugged

I love Weatherbug. I have the app on my phone, I have the extension on my browser... Just love it. When it comes to the weather, I am always in need-to-know mode.

One of my friends lives in Sydney, Australia. I can even check out his weather when I just feel like hating him. He's always ranting about how beautiful the photos of Alaska are. Can't wait until the day he visits. I have plans to leave him on the side of the road in deep snow for about five minutes.  Not long enough for him to really hate me something awful, but long enough that he won't be so chipper about Alaska winters.

Anyway.

I am posting to talk about the glorious weather we are having. So freaking sunny, I feel like I have overdosed on happiness.

One question, though: why is it going to be so much warmer later in the day?

3 p.m. - 36 degrees...

7 p.m. - 40 degrees

But, really, do I care?

Mostly sunny and FORTY degrees on Thursday. Whoo-hoo!

Nope. Not when Thursday is looking that good. Shoot, that's practically sunbathing weather for (some of) us Alaskans. I stay covered with sunscreen myself, but, dangit, won't it be nice to feel some of that sunshine!!!

If you haven't figured it out by now, it doesn't take much to make me happy.

Let's celebrate with a song. (Change "rain" to "snow" & "gone" to "almost gone" and we've got a hit folks!)

Peace
--Free