How to be happy when it’s so cold your snot could freeze

Over the last few days, the Black Hills and much of the western United States have fallen victim to a really serious cold front sucked down from the arctic by moving pressure systems. That’s a fancy pants way of saying that it is freaking freezing here. The sun has been shining through most of this, which makes it that much harder to understand why you feel like you’ve been punched in the gut two seconds after leaving your nice, heated house. Cold this big hurts.

But it’s not all bad. Once you’re sure your pets are safely back inside and your pipes are unfrozen and you’ve given up on the idea of saving your roses, there are some definite benefits to weather this bitterly cold.

1. Hand-knit socks

Grandma gave them to you six years ago for Christmas or a birthday and at the time it was all you could do to smile and say “thank you” and try to mean it. You stuck them in your drawer where they eventually made their way to the very, very bottom of the back, behind the pair of holey Snoopy socks that you just can’t bear to throw away and underneath the neon-pink garter belt you got because you thought it would be sexy but discovered it’s just plain embarrassing. But now, that thick, scratchy, lime-green-and-orange pair of goodness is all you can think about, and when you finally get over your shock and how warm and cozy they are, you’ll have to send your grandma a very belated thank you card, and really mean it this time.

2. Fireplaces

If you have one, count it a blessing. I’ve been trying to figure out a place to put one in my house since I moved in with no luck. I’m almost ready to settle for the Fire Channel on cable. Instead, I’ve been borrowing fireplaces at other people’s houses, and enjoying them thoroughly. Propane is nice because you can get copious amounts of heat in a very short time, which is perfect for defrosing after walking in from the car. Wood is even better, because while you can’t shoot from a body temperature of 80.4 to 103.7 in five minutes flat, you can toast marshmallows. Thought marshmallows were just for campfires in the summer? You’re wrong. They’re definitely for deadly cold winter indoor-fires too.

3. Hot soup

I love soup. It runs in my family, I think, though I came later to the appreciation than my siblings. A good, thick soup is the perfect solution for a cold day rumbling stomach. Something with potatoes is always good. Chile is excellent. I just had a ham and many-bean soup for lunch, though, and I think that might be my new favorite cold-day food. It was salty and hot and oh-so-good. If it didn’t cost $4/bowl, (“bowl”), I would have to have gone back for seconds. I’ll be looking up a recipe shortly, you can be sure.

4. Hot chocolate+

If you want a real project, you can make up real hot chocolate with milk and actual chocolate on your stove. If you do that, drink it straight, and enjoy. Otherwise, any old cocoa powder will do, because once you add the schnapps, the quality of the cocoa matters a lot less. Peppermint is my favorite, though cinnamon, caramel, or marshmallow (seriously!) are also good. If you feel nutty, I recommend amaretto or frangelico. Mmm. It’s also hard to go wrong with Bailey’s or Kahlua, and if you’re really desperate, just about anything you have in your cabinet will be okay. Warms you up from the inside out. And in case I haven’t already made my love of marshmallows abundantly clear, a few marshmallows on top is an excellent idea.

5. A huge, hairy cat

Maybe they make you sneeze, but there’s no denying that a cat is about the best lap-blanket ever invented. Not only do they keep your lap warm, if you pet them enough, they might give you a thigh massage (y’know… that kneading thing they do with their paws when they’re really happy). If just thinking about cats makes your eyes start to swell up, a dog might also do in a pinch.

6. Sleeping

If you have the option, stay in bed as long as you possibly can. Noon is good. Two is better. Cold temperatures actually cause the body to want to sleep more. It’s a defense mechanism, a way of conserving energy. There are few things as lovely as a huge fluffy blanket to burrow down into. And if you can’t sleep that long, stay in bed anyway. Get a good book or flip on the TV if you must. Now that you’re an adult, this is as close as you’ll get to playing hooky from school with “the flu.”

7. Reading

Dig up that brain candy book you’ve been waiting to read and take this freezing opportunity to pretend your TV and internet are broken, curl up under a fluffy blanket, and read until your eyes start to go crossed. If you can’t keep reading for longer than a few minutes at a time, your book obviously needs to be lower quality. Days when you can binge-read should not be reserved for catching up on your classics, it’s a time for gobbling up a stack of harlequins or the next book in that formula mystery series or a nice sword and sorcery tome of at least 900 pages. If you have the option, try to talk someone’s ear off about the characters and plot, even if the other person doesn’t care.

8. Candles

You’ve got them all over your house because they’re pretty, or they smell nice, or you want to be ready when the electricity goes out, but here’s hoping that never actually becomes a problem. And since we’re being optimistic, and you’ll never need to burn those candles, this is the perfect opportunity to do it because you can. Though not as obviously warming as a fireplace, having an actual flame nearby makes a room feel warmer, even if it’s just the ambiance. Fragrances like pine and cinnamon can make a winter day seem cozier, and if you feel wild, you could even try toasting mini-marshmallows. (Get it? Mini fire, mini marshmallows!)

9. Bubble baths

Nothing is better for defrosting extremities than a nice, hot bath (especially if you don’t have a fireplace). Pour in an overly-generous dose of bubbles and see if you can get the bubbles to tower twice as high as the tub itself. It’s a good game. (May want to have a life-preserver handy.) The best part is that bubble baths can be combined with any number of the above-listed goodies. Bring your hot chocolate and a book, but probably not your socks or the cat. Soak until you’re so wrinkly your mate will mistake you for your grandmother, then move along to the next wonderful icy-day activity.

10. Canoodling

This is the best one of all. Grab someone you’re particularly fond of and attach yourself. Hamster piles are fine, but a little one-on-one cuddling action is a treat not to be missed on any occasion. Here, the cold is just an excuse. Must huddle together for body warmth, eh?

Aaaah.

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I Heart Books – REAL Books – Especially MY Books

I’ve read two e-books, both while I was in Belgium and didn’t have access to a well-stocked library of English-language literature. I found the experience rather irritating, but also rather pleasing. It was irritating because I couldn’t curl up with my book in bed or shove it in my purse to take with me, but pleasing because I got to read the full text of a couple books for free free free without having to go anywhere to get them.

But I will never give up the pleasure of reading hard copies of books. There are a lot of things I do read online, and would rather read online than in hard copy. Newspapers, for example. The effort it takes to drag 60 pounds of old newspapers to a recycling center hardly makes being environmentally responsible about reading them worthwhile. USAtoday.com is way easier, AND I don’t have to even shuffle the sports pages off to the side.

But books, ah! books. They make me happy in so many ways. Usually weighing in at less than a pound, they contain hours of portable entertainment, worlds to uncover and characters to love. You can dip in and out of them at your own pace, gobble down everything your favorite author ever wrote or choose just as easily to never, ever read something by a certain author ever again. Books are the ultimate in user-friendly.

I’m an aspiring author. Who isn’t? Well, I guess I AM a writer already, but I aspire to be a published novelist. Since, so far, all my fiction is unoriginal (and some directly ripped off other people’s ideas), I’m going to have to wait awhile before I can get anything into print that will actually earn me some money.

Until then, I can print books myself!

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Even knowing that no decent publisher would take the stuff in my self-printed books, I am proud of them. This is the first book I’ve printed, a Zine (Fanzine) for my Nerd Club. It is a compilation of stories written by a total of 17 different authors, full of artwork by 5 or 6 different people. I edited, printed, and bound the whole sucker by myself, and by gum if I don’t think it’s the best thing ever.

The satisfaction of holding a bound book in your hands is double when it’s something you helped write yourself.

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Swapping Books

Last weekend, Deadwood hosted the South Dakota Festival of Books. Many local and regional authors convened to sell books, sign books, talk about books, and read books. My mother in law, Nyla Griffith, was among those authors, championing her first novel, Lucky Strike.

Some day, maybe I’ll proudly brandish a name tag with the title “Author” on it as well.

But for this weekend, I was there as a volunteer. Last year, I joined an online book trading site – paperbackswap.com. I read about them in a newspaper article and thought to myself, “self, you have a lot of junky books that you’ve never read, never will read, or will never read again. Why not trade them in for books you’d rather have?”

And so I did. And so I wound up volunteering at their booth at the SD Festival of Books, extolling the virtues of trading unloved books for ones you’d rather have. Apparently I enjoyed myself so much, I’ll just keep right on extolling! So:

I adore Paperback Swap. All you have to do is list the books you don’t want any more, wait for someone to request one, then stick it in the mail. Every time you mail a book to someone else, you can choose a book to have mailed to you. To date, I’ve sent out something like 40 books, and received about 30 books in return. My husband likes this because it keeps the balance of books in our house relatively even.

And seriously. What’s better than getting a book in the mail?

Paperbacks, hardcovers, audio books – you can swap ‘em all. If you’re a book hoarder, fear not! You can keep all the books you receive, if you like them that well. Too attached to your other books to let any of them go? Surely you must have a friend or a relative who reads Harlequins! Offer to trade away their books and share the bounty you receive in turn. Everyone wins.

I’m assuming my readers are bibliophiles like myself, and if this sounds like an ad, I guess it is. There are currently over a million books listed on the site, but every time new members join, that number goes up, and it becomes easier to find the books you want. So go sign up! Do it today! And when you do, tell them Snukes sent you.

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