Fish Taco Solution

Sorry for whining about the weather, but as I've explained, it's part of my nature, and it's been below freezing for the entire eleven days of this month and it's still Autumn, and I'm a little tired of being cold all the time.

When it snows, sometimes I like to put on surfing music and wear flip flops and floral prints. It helps ease my mind and warms me up a little. At least it makes me smile. I am a beach bum through and through.

I found another solution to surviving the cold and making it seem like summer; the fish taco. The spicy flavour, the fact that it's fish, the fact that it's a taco, the lime; all these things make me think of tropical, easygoing, mahalo, warmness.

I bit into that awesome taco and was transported.

So if you're feeling blue because of this early winter we seem to be experiencing in North America, head out to your favourite taco place and order a fish taco. It will help, and that's a guarantee.

So. September Sucked.‏

I have decided that I hate September and I'm really mad about it.

Like, I can't believe it's already October 10. Wasn't it summer like two minutes ago?

Just when I made up with Snow, and Summer, now I have to break up with September. What's the deal? September used to be that month where you were all done with summer and ready for the new school year. Even after I was all done with school, I still used September as a renewal month to set new goals and look forward to a new year.

Now September is still hot and I'm not ready to let go of summer, but there's school and homework and routine and I'm not ready yet! How did September sneak up on me so fast? This summer went by too fast and it felt like we didn't do anything awesome. I wasn't ready for summer to leave this year and September was so weird. Hot one day, snowing the next. September, you were one moody beeotch this year. I guess I just got caught off guard this year, but it's been happening the last couple of years and it needs to stop.

I have found that February, April and September are the worst months for me. This has been bothering me for awhile, so of course I've been thinking and thinking and tossing it around in my brain for some time. I've come to the conclusion that one of the reasons that these months affect me so much is that they are so wonderful in BC and so not like that here in Utah. I'm trying so hard to bloom where I'm planted, but it's hard sometimes.

Since I'm whining about September, I'll talk about September and leave the other months for some other time. September in Vancouver is sunny, crisp, fall colours, and rain. You are instantly inspired to snuggle up in your tights and boots and sweaters. It is so beautiful. The weather changes, and it stays that way. There is none of this yo-yo scalding shorts and flip flops one day, snowing the next. There's too much whiplash weather here in the in-between seasons. In Vancouver you are eased into to the miserable weather and it rains a lot more. Here, it's summer one day, and winter the next. I hate it.

Did I mention I hate it? I had such a hard time this year. Getting into the routine of school and homework was like a slap in the face this year. Huey is doing a little better this year, but it's still a struggle. If I only had him to focus on, it would be okay, but Dewey is still at the point where I have to sit with him and listen to him read and help with math and by the time I'm done with all that, I'm too tired to fight with Huey.

I also struggled with finding time to do anything that gave me joy. I couldn't get myself inspired to blog, so I didn't make the time to write, and that was a bad idea. I've been composing this post in my head for three weeks, but just could never take the time to sit down and get it out of my brain. Reading seemed like such a drag too. I dunno if it was the book I was reading, or just the time of year, but the book was nice enough, I just couldn't get motivated to take the time to read when there were so many other things to do. Forget about sewing or doing anything else creative. My craft room looks like a bomb hit it and I just want to cry every time I think about it.

I just feel like time is racing away from me right now. Soon enough it will be Halloween, Thanksgiving, and Christmas. It feels like time is going faster and faster and I have no way of catching up. I need to take a break and regroup, but I'm so worried that if I even take the time to breathe, that so much time will have passed that I'll be even further behind!

I don't feel organized and on top of things. I can't stop to rest until my chores are done and I just can't get caught up. I need some peace and quiet so that I can get myself back in order, but time is racing by so quickly that I just don't have the time to get in order. I need to make the time, but I just can't figure out when!

Ways to Fail at Combating Homesickness – The Rain

I’m certain that it’s well documented here that I like precipitation. Every time it rains I get so happy because it makes me think of home. When one lives in a desert-like climate, the rain is few and far between.

Recently, Little Sister posted the following on Facebook and we had a little public convo about it:

Little Sister posted a photo – “Its raining a little.”

Little Sister – Guess who gets homesick when it rains? (two people like this, me, and her fourteen year old son)

Me – MEEE TOOOO!! Just wait; you’ll rejoice when it snows because at least it’s precipitation. Mark my words.

Little Sister – When it rains here, it really rains!

Me – yeah, here not so much – being the desert and all.

Little Sister moved a year or so ago to New Brunswick and has been posting a lot about the weather, especially the snow which as British Columbians, we never truly experienced growing up. The weather in BC is so unique that it really takes a special sort of person to be able to endure it. (webbed feet help)

Little Sister and I are those kinds of people. We have always loved the BC weather, rain and all. I find it interesting that she and I are the only ones who have moved away from BC even though we both love it so much and neither one of us planned on ever leaving the coast. I also find it soothing that she misses the weather just as much as I do, even though she lives in a climate that is very much different to mine.

I should also not that neither one of us has webbed feet. I just thought I should clear that up.

The rain, it just does something to you…

Storm's Comin' Ani

I love this time of year – its drive with the windows down weather!!

I was on my way to Del Taco for fish tacos and rejoiced that the sun was not blazing down – it was actually cloudy. The kind of oppressive cloudy where the roiling clouds are bearing down on you with impending doom. The impending doom of wind and rain and thunder and lightning. I had to do a little happy dance on my way to the car celebrating the weather.

Side note: I thought I had made up a word with roiling (rolling and boiling), but spell check didn’t spazz out so I had to look it up and it’s an actual word.

Verb (used with object)

1.

To render (water, wine, etc.) turbid by stirring up sediment.

2.

To disturb or disquiet; irritate; vex: to be roiled by a delay.

Verb (used without object)

3.

To move or proceed turbulently.

---

Origin: 1580–90;  origin uncertain

Related forms

un·roiled, adjective

Can be confused: roil, royal.

Synonyms
2. Annoy, fret, ruffle, exasperate, provoke, rile

.

I’m happy and sad about that.

Other side note: Whattheheck Del Taco? No lime in my second fish taco? Where’s my lime, bishes?!

What can I say? I love weather. I love the changes, the unpredictability, the clouds, the wind, the rain – you know. The shapes the clouds make, the colours of the clouds and the sky. The feeling of the wind, that it can be calm and soothing and then immediately whip into a frenzy and be all crazy. The way the wind feels against my skin and in my hair.

The air is all electric and pending. There is that crazy, tingly, butterflies-right-before-going-on-stage feeling of something coming. I can feel it in my bones and on my skin and in my hair.

I love how the sky feels so close, like its right on top of you and peering over your shoulder about to do all kinds of naughty things.

I love this time of year.

Seriously? You’re going to talk about the weather?

Frozen Trees

Let me explain myself: I am from the West Coast of British Columbia. I grew up talking about the weather constantly. There’s a lot of weather there, so we talk about it - a lot.

January is the month when I want to crawl in a hole and die. I hate January so so so much. I just want to run away from January. Nothing good comes from January.

That’s not entirely true. I was married in January – that was pretty awesome. I have some friends that were born in January and I like them, so that’s a good thing. I usually love New Year’s, there’s the beginning of awards season, and Sundance, but everything else is out.

This year so far has been a struggle. We get these inversion things where the cold air is sucked in and trapped in the valley and I HATE them. The air doesn’t move and it’s hazy and below freezing and nothing melts. YUCK. The air quality is so bad. Everything is grey. Not angry stormy rainy or snowy skies grey, but no colour nothing happening in the sky grey; blah grey. It's like the sun doesn't even work. Of the 17 days we’ve had of January, ten of them have been inversions and three of them have been where it snows all day and the commute is awful and you don’t want to go anywhere. We had some snow at the beginning of the year – just a couple of inches - which made the ground cold, which caused an inversion, which made it even colder. This lasted a week. Then we got a big wind storm which mixed the air enough to clear everything out, give the sun a chance to come through and warm things up, and bring in another snow storm. This storm brought an additional twelve inches. This continued to keep the ground cold and caused another inversion. It has been so cold this year. Bitter cold. My bones ache and I’m so tired. I’m pretty sure we’ve only had two or three days where the high temperature has been above freezing. It’s so cold and the air quality is so bad, that even if I had the time, I can’t take Orso out for a walk and he is going stir crazy. Everything is icy and grey and snow covered and I’m miserable. I can’t get warm. I can’t get motivated.

Eli McCann posts about what a cruel, cruel witch January is. I really couldn’t agree more.

January is supposed to be the month that you start the new year and work on all those awesome goals you set for yourself. This is a joke because January is so depressing that you have even less motivation to do anything to improve yourself. I just feel like cancelling everything. The weather is really affecting my mood.  This bums me out to no end. It’s been on my mind and I’ve been stewing it around for some time. This is unacceptable to me. I hate feeling so UGH all the time. Since I made up with Snow and with Summer, I have been trying to figure out how to make up with January.

I have come up with a few things, but I’m not quite there yet. Here are some of the things I’ve been mulling around:

Manicure with Summer Colours

• I’m trying to come up with a Get out of your Funk/Listen to when you’re Blue playlist – but it’s slow going. I have been listening to my Summer playlist which has helped a little, but not enough.
• 
  

  It gets foggy with an inversion and sometimes the fog freezes causing my world to look like this, so there is some beauty.
  

  

  Weeping Japanese Maple covered in frost

  
  
• The boys want to learn how to ski/snowboard. DH has skied Utah, but not since he’s lived here and I have done some skiing and snowboarding and love it, but haven’t had the time nor funds to take that on since moving to Utah. There’s a hill about an hour and a half away from here that’s really good for kids to learn on. When an inversion happens, it’s actually warmer up in the mountains than down in the valley, and going up in the mountains is the way to escape the inversion. Going up in the mountains is good exercise. I put my snowboarding pants on in order to shovel the driveway last Saturday and I had to let the adjustable waist out because I could barely get them on! That was a wake up call for me as I have not worn the pants for about two years. (Last year was really crummy as far as snowfall was concerned) I have this total hatred of driving in snowy conditions, so driving up in the mountains on purpose in the winter seems like a really dumb thing to do, and a three hour drive round trip seems like a major time commitment, which is why I’m still mulling it around. I should look into this further.
• The Sundance Independent Film Festival happens every January. I should volunteer. I almost did a couple of years ago, but was feeling too crappy in January to fully commit. All I want to do is hunker down and disappear in January, not go out in the cold and manage crowd control. Plus the weather is so unpredictable, and the aforementioned hate of driving in the mountains in the snow. Park City is not nearly as far away as I think it is, and it’s out of the inversion. I still think this would be such a fun thing to do, so I’m still stewing on this too. Maybe next year.
• In past years I have made improvements to my winter wardrobe. There is a lot more wool and cashmere. I have really good winter boots, the aforementioned snowboarding pants that are GREAT for walking the dog in the snow, and a down jacket that keeps me warm. I have some cute hats, gloves and scarves that make going outside MUCH less painful. I love all my warm tights and cozy sweaters and socks, but I’m a bit bored with some of my wardrobe (skirts, pants, shirts) and in a bit of a funk because I don’t want to buy anything new because of my size. I am in major need of a winter wardrobe makeover. I need to weed a lot of things out. I think this will help me to feel better. I always feel better after I clean out my closet.

• 

  Happy Face mug, Red Spoon

  I have this Happy Face mug that totally makes me smile. It’s great for hot chocolate, which also makes me smile, but hot chocolate is so huge in calories and so bad for my skin when I drink it on a regular basis, but it is so good for warming the cockles of my soul when it’s so so so very cold outside.
• I ran away to Maui once in January – that was perfect, but I can’t exactly afford to run off to the tropics any time it’s cold. I have a tropical island photo on my desktop. That helps, but only a little.
• I’ve been eating oatmeal – that warms me up, but I worry again about calories.
• I’ve been baking and cooking. This also makes me worry about calories. I also make a big mess and there are twice as many dishes, but moving around doing dishes warms me up, running the dishwasher and using the oven warms the house up, and YUM!
• I have been trying to go to the gym – working out warms one up like no one’s business, but I’m still adjusting to DH being home. He seems to take up more of my time than anyone.
• I could do a manicure with happy hot colours, but my hands are so dry and my nails are so brittle...
• We had our house built with a chimney, but didn’t let the builders put in our fireplace as it was so much extra money, and we wanted to be able to do it on our own terms and in our own time. We need to put in our fireplace, but it only costs money. We’ve been in the house almost seven years…

Sitting by the fire in my cashmere sweater, wool socks, and jeans that fit, sipping hot chocolate, munching on chocolate chip cookies and listening to good music while reading a good book after a day in the mountains sounds as close to perfect as it can get, doesn’t it?