Snow Days

Though it's pretty much all melted away in today's bizarrely warm weather, here are some pictures of the recent snow storm(s) we had. I'm not sure of the final inch count, but I'd guess we got 8-10 inches, easy.

Christmas blues (and silver)

In New York, it's an unspoken rule that Jewish employees work the Christian holidays, and then Christians work the Jewish holidays, so everyone gets to celebrate without too many problems. Except where I work. Where I work, our senior editors, who are mostly Jewish, take off all the holidays. In fact my direct supervisor (who is also middle management) jokes that next year they're going to start taking the Eid's off.

I bring this up because I'm at work on a Christmas Eve night. Two other middle management editors were here with me earlier in the evening. We are all Christians. Meanwhile, upper management, as always, took the day off. And the rest of the week. While it is Hanukkah week, they did not take the first part of the week off. Instead, they took the part of the week off that the Christian holiday falls on.

I'm a little annoyed by it, but more so I feel sorry for my boss who wanted off to spend the holiday with his family upstate. Instead he had to work today and then drive up after work. Then he has to be back at work Friday morning. Merry Christmas, eh?

In other news...

The New York Times has a column today about hooking up written by a dude named Charles M. Blow. I kid you not. Something tells me that was lost on the editors there.

Amusing Bumper Sticker of the Day

I saw it on a mini-van on my way to work:

"I'm straight, but I'm not narrow."

I assume as in "minded."

Winter, my new mortal enemy

Learning to navigate snow and to dress warmly (but not too warmly so I sweat and then get sick from being wet AND cold) have been quite the adventure since I moved north two and a half years ago. Now in my third winter, I'm doing OK with the first two, but what I haven't mastered - indeed what has gotten worse - is the dry air.

In the past winters this has resulted in cracked hands (very painful) and constantly chapped lips (there isn't enough lip balm in the world) and a pair of really nasty looking feet bottoms. I live in an apartment, so I do not have a humidifier hooked up to my heating unit. I've considered buying a freestanding one, but haven't gotten around to it yet. I'd probably not clean it out properly and then mold would grow in it and I'd have a whole new set of problems.

Anyway, this winter something new presented itself. Itchy, itchy skin. The kind of itchy where I can't sleep at night and when I do I have fitful dreams about scratching my legs, and in fact am probably scratching my legs in my sleep. I haven't itched like this since I had the chicken pox as a child. And yet, it's not a pox or poison ivy because there's no rash or bumps. At least not initially, now with all the scratching my legs are pretty gross. It's mostly my legs (upper and lower), though now my upper arms are itchy too (though nothing like my legs). I tried putting lotion on them - including Vaseline intensive rescue clinical therapy, which is supposed to be prescription strength, and Gold Bond Ultimate Healing lotion, which has worked wonders on my hands. But nothing has helped. Today I'm going back to the store for something to help with the itching, which hopefully won't make matters worse by drying out my skin even more.

Any suggestions or tips?

Not dead yet

I survived both the repairs to my heater and the blood letting (a.k.a. layoffs) my company had today.

In other news, my downstairs neighbor/stalker moved away. I now have zero stalkers. Hurray!

Uh...shouldn't you shut the gas off first?

So a couple of guys are at my apartment trying to fix my heat (radiator around the baseboards). And I hear one guy say to the other guy, "OK, we only get one shot at this."

If you don't hear from me again it's because they've blown up this apartment. Again.