I hate January. I say it every year. While I will give January props for not being the absolute darkest time of the year--it's still a little light past 5 p.m., thank gawd and that helps-- I swear it's colder than December ever is. It's freezing, there's ice in the air all the time, if you're lucky you can go outside without gloves around 3 p.m., and that's not even mentioning the holiday hangover and everybody broke facets of the month.

On my way to the gym, as I was dressed in multiple layers and sweats and heavy winter coat and gloves and all that crap, I saw some poor girl obviously doing the Morning Walk of Shame. That actually isn't something I run into that often in this town, but she was wearing a very lovely SHORT clubbing dress and sparkly hose and high heels and a little coat, trudging down the looooooong path along the edge of campus. Hence my ah, deduction on the Walk of Shame. I felt so sorry for that girl, but also kind of wondered how the hell anyone can dress like that in January, even if they are indoors while clubbing. I think I'd bring some warmer clothes around for the next morning if I was going to crash overnight somewhere and then have to walk home, at least.

Today I went to a local craft fair that is put on by one of the Craft Center instructors, and of course I have friends who do it. It was very unpleasantly cold when I arrived at a bit before noon. And when I say that, I mean that people were huddled under blankets, carrying blankets around, wishing they had face warmers. (One friend brought his baby and I was thinking, "Damn, I'd leave the baby home today if I were you, it's too cold for adults here." Especially since he was there with two other chicks, one of whom I'm presuming is the mom, so clearly they had babysitting.) And no joke, I saw one woman sitting at her booth in a sleeping bag from the shoulders down. I only hope she didn't have to get up much today. While the craft fair was a good one for being small--good work and nice selection-- as you can imagine, there wasn't a hell of a lot of people there. To the point where I wondered if it was worth everyone's time and money to set up their stuff if it was that frigid out.

I hung out there for around a half hour or so and then walked to the Craft Center, where I was doing a makeup shift. On my way there, I saw some girl wearing nothing but a sweatshirt, SHORT shorts, and flip-flops. It seriously took all of my restraint to NOT scream at her, "WHAT THE HELL IS WRONG WITH YOU!?! Why on earth, on a day like today where everyone is bundled up like Eskimos and freezing any showing skin off their bodies, did you decide to roll out of bed and put on your sexy shorts and your skimpiest shoes and walk around town?" I do not comprehend the logic of these idiots. Look, if I'm a native Californian and I know better than to wear shorts in January, what is wrong with you? It's not all "it never rains in California here" even though the songs claim it, you guys! I later mentioned this to other CC folk, who rolled their eyes and were all, "That girl must be from southern California."

As for the Craft Center itself--well, the Craft Center is usually the warmest place to go in the entire town. Even if I am dressed a la that kid in A Christmas Story when I walk in, by the time I start doing a shift I have stripped down to my innermost layer. And since heat rises, the upstairs is usually toasty. Well, not today. I don't know why the hell it was frosty cold up there, but it honestly felt like someone had turned on the air conditioning on the second floor. And they don't have AC up there in summer, so where that draft was coming from, I do not know. We had one lady stomp on downstairs, saying it was way too cold up there to work on her quilting project. Now, I was doing a makeup shift there for 3 hours (one fellow was out for that long, and coincidentally that is how long I will be out come this Thursday) and then planned on going upstairs to do some spinning, but after the guy came back in, I just dragged the wheel downstairs into the lobby to get my work done. Worth it.

Oddly enough, it was actually WARMER going home tonight in the dark and cold than it had been all day. Less wind, anyway.

I do not know how people who live in real weather places with long-lasting snow do it, I really don't. This is the time of year where I start fantasizing about moving to Arizona where I might be only wearing two layers, or something.

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