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This. This is what I see when I look out of my bedroom window right now.

….

Yesterday was 60F!

…

What happened?!? D:

It’s been going back and forth between snowing and slushing (that is to say, snow/freezing rain mix) for most of the day. The roads are pretty much clear (if slushy) but still! It’s 35F out now （πーπ） I know snow isn’t impossible for March (the first day of March this year was snow, actually…) but I was so full of hope for the coming Spring~

In unrelated news, I have discovered that there are Lucky Star Nendoroids. Konata~~ ♥♥♥ ebay was full of jacked up prices so I went to y!Ja and scored myself a homepage version Konata （V＾－°）イエイ！ Still looking for a homepage Kagami (that isn’t $150, anyway…). I want to get a Tsukasa and Miyuki eventually but I feel like I should make sure I actually like Nendoroids before I get carried away XD Their shape really compliments the Lucky Star cast, I think. Suzumiya’s can go either way (normally proportioned type or chibi) but Konata looks really weird proportioned like a normal human （＾▽＾笑） it’s just not right! The last DVD of Lucky Star is coming out in the US this month, so I’ll be looking forward to the eventual series box version~ it’s not definite to happen by any means, but publishers seem to be catching on that Box Sets are a Good Idea so one can only hope… I watched a little of the dub on youtube and while it doesn’t make me want to claw my ears off I still prefer the original 声優 – Konata’s has a style I really like (and that isn’t easy to replicate in English anyway).

I have to be careful not to overindulge with Lucky Star merch… （*’‐’*)

Tonight we move the clocks ahead one hour. Since it’s been lighter and lighter lately this means the evenings will be mildly sunny now~

I really dislike how dark it gets during winter here. Once it’s dark, it’s dark, and there’s no way to know how late it is by the darkness outside… it’s disorienting. 6am and 6pm are both the same pitch black emptiness. I think… if it was still warm, but dark, it wouldn’t be so bad, but that’s just not possible since the sun is what produces the light and we’re farther away during the winter months so it’s colder…

I’d like to live somewhere warmer, but I’m discouraged from trying. Warmer climates have so many unfamiliar problems, like hurricanes, earthquakes… it’s not like snowstorms can’t be dangerous but compared to other things it seems almost safe. Safe, but cold.

I don’t know how I’ll fare, continuing to live in this climate. Previously, growing up, I’d think about moving somewhere else after school. The possibility was always there, so it was something to look forward to. But now… this weather will never change. When I say things like, winter is really hard for me, people brush it off, because, “Winter is tough on everyone” or some baseless blanket statement like that. So I don’t bother to mention it much, although it should be evident anyway. Maybe I’m not strong enough, but I don’t know what I’d be working towards.

Yesterday it finally got up to around 45F, and in celebration of the coming spring, I opened a bunch of windows in the house.

The fresh air really helps my motivation to do things, especially cleaning. This may be part of the reason why I’m really unproductive in winter – the house barely stays warm as it is, if I were to open a window, even for a few minutes, all would be lost… ( ｉдｉ )

Laundry is the easiest task to tackle, since even though I don’t air-dry much anymore (I have too great a love of warm cloth coming out of the dryer to avoid it) I do hang up blankets to let them air out periodically. Plus, with fresh air, I naturally think of clean clothing~

Cleaning flat surfaces like tile are also much easier to deal with when there’s a nice breeze moving through the room. I do try to avoid using harsh chemicals anyway, but it can feel so stuffy, not to mention all of the junk that gets kicked up into the air during cleaning…

The cats enjoyed it too, I think, and spent the hours with open windows racing around the house. XD

Unfortunately today has been rainy and gross, and kind of chilly out…

When I woke up this morning, I was afraid I forgot to log in to PG and dress up for Saturday (Jp time) (°口°;) ！！
But it turned out that I did dress up properly and so far I haven’t missed a day this year （v＾－°）イエイ！
I tried cleaning up my girly room today. (；　-　。-) =3 That didn’t go so well. I got very little done before I started getting really cold…

Which brings me to my last point. We’ve gone back down into below freezing temps o(；△；)o
もういい！I’ve had enough of this cold! Why can’t it just be spring already?
I’m not even excited about my birthday. It’s too cold.

Kanji:
Working on Level 4 Final Test, attempting to get 100% on all 10 lessons.

Cleaning:
Bedroom, clothes organized, floor vacuumed. Next up? Sewing room. Or living room. Not sure.

Ice:
This is a losing battle ヽ(　￣д￣;)ノ the deep freeze is coming again…. but at least the mailbox is clear. For now.

Spending Ban:
Still going strong! ┌(・。・)┘♪└(・。・)┐♪┌(・。・)┘

Or, I should really say “Lack of Packages”
I did my best to clear out the area by the mailbox today, chopping through several layers of ice to reach the pavement beneath, but I’m still not sure if that’s enough since we didn’t get any mail today… although that does happen occasionally anyway, it’s ambiguous :/
On top of that, I was supposed to receive an EMS package today based on tracking, but I never saw anyone, and the updated tracking now says they tried to deliver it ridiculously early in the morning and that they left a notice… but if they did, I can’t find one! No slip on or by the door or in the mailbox :/ So I can’t even pick it up at the post office without that…
Tomorrow I will watch like a hawk ( > 3 <) I want my fluffy coat!

So you know how I was trying to dig out my mailbox yesterday?
It snowed. AGAIN. today.
So plows have reburied everything D:
Really not happy about this ( > >)

In other news, I uncovered my old lyrics and have been reading them over to get back in the habit of writing them. About half are usable as-is and the rest need at least a little tweaking, which isn’t bad. I even tried singing one of them and recorded it (nothing worth sharing yet, though!) and it felt pretty natural~

I wanted to go up to the mall today and look at keyboards but that obviously didn’t happen…

For brunch today, I went out to dim sum.
I have to admit it.
I don’t think I like dim sum.
I mean, I like the concept of it, being able to pick and choose small quantities of food, with a large variety of types, but I just… I can’t really find anything I actually want to eat.
People think I might like Tapas better. I’m not sure. I might have the same problem.
So since I didn’t eat much at dim sum, we went to Friendly’s afterwards, where I had a sandwich XD
And of course I got some ice cream to bring home (even though it’s been in the low teens (F) lately…)

I was going to just go back outside and try to clear out the area by the mailbox (since the Postal Services left a little illustrated note showing how you should and shouldn’t keep the area around your mailbox clear… we hadn’t really being doing anything. It felt like a passive aggressive tactic to say “remove the snow or you won’t get any mail” XD)
BUT the Cat Genie was beeping and wasn’t draining properly :/

So I had to disassemble it and figure out what happened.
Apparently a TON of the granules had gotten into the hopper area so it couldn’t drain. I don’t know why still, so I can’t completely prevent it, but at least I know what to research now…
It seems to be working at the moment, but who knows what will happen tomorrow…

So after that mess, I went outside to clear the snow. Or, I should really say, ice. Layers and layers of ice.
It was a slow, incomplete process. I will try again tomorrow, since no mail is coming then anyway.

It’s only 5pm and I feel exhausted already XD

I find it really hard to do anything productive (especially anything that involves moving) when it’s cold out.
Now, this isn’t just because it’s cold outside, it’s because that means it’s also cold inside.
Maybe you’re thinking “but don’t you have heat?”
Well yeah, I do, but not good heat. Running it a lot basically just keeps the house from freezing, and our normal “room temp” is around 50-53F (10-12C) which is pretty chilly, if you ask me. But oil is expensive, and most of the house sucks at retaining heat. Either the windows aren’t properly insulated or it’s just because of the cathedral ceiling, I don’t know, but I do know that the result is a freaking cold living room and a pretty cold rest of the house.
Sure, I have blankets, and my little electric ceramic heater, but those only keep me warm if I’m glued to them.

Sometimes I feel like my body doesn’t really produce much heat. Being in hot weather doesn’t bother me nearly as much as it does other people, and it takes very little to cool me down.
But warming up? I either have to a) take a very hot bath, b) sit in front of a 500F wood stove or c) do some serious exercise, but NONE of those effects last very long. It’s like I’m a black hole for heat….

I’m really better suited for hot climates.

So why don’t I live in one?

Don’t ask me…. ┐(￣ー￣)┌　

Generally, I don’t have any problem finding things that I would like to own. Being somewhat of a tech geek, I’m always on the lookout for the latest and greatest (as well as the cutest), but these aren’t always things you can put on a wishlist for other people to buy for you.
So I default to things like books, games and videos, in that order. But even those become sparse when I don’t consume what I have or if nothing good is coming out. Or, and this is the case every year, I haven’t even had time to really look over what I got for Christmas before people are asking me what I want for my birthday.
This is the problem with having a birthday so close to Christmas (a little over a month after). I’d much rather celebrate my half-birthday in August, but that doesn’t work out so well either, since it overlaps slightly with the someone else’s birthday, and no one celebrates “birthday-delayed-by-four-months” so I’m stuck with February.
Which, living in the Northeast, means my birthday is filled with ice, snow and general icky winterness. Plans are frequently delayed by bad weather and I’m usually very lethargic and uninterested in the winter season. I have to say I disagree with anyone who says that living or being born in the cold adapts you to it – I’m exactly the opposite. I really dislike the cold, I’m almost always cold except for certain times in summer when it reaches 80F or higher, and if I thought I had more choice in the matter, I would not have picked the Northeast for my permanent living location. I can’t dress the way I want, I don’t have the energy I do when it’s warmer, I struggle to be optimistic through the end of March, thinking “Spring is coming and then it will be Summer.” over and over again.
All of this adds up to the fact that the things I really want can’t be bought for me, right now:
- a 64GB iPod Touch { Apple, this one is up to you! }
- summer weather! { travel and lightboxes do not count. I need the warmth more than the light, and travel is too brief }
- to lose weight instantaneously without icky consequences { I’m working on this but faster is better… haha XD }
- to have the knowledge of all 1945 common use kanji implanted into my head { doing this manually is so tedious! XD }