Yes friends, it is still cold here. Temperature right now is a balmy 12oF and with wind chill the ‘real feel ‘ is -14oF. Yes, you read right – MINUS 14 degrees!
I did venture out today. Thought I should drive the VW since I haven’t driven it in a few days, and I needed to get rid of a bunch of recycling. The roads weren’t bad. The drifting I noticed yesterday was less today. Still numbingly cold though. But I accomplished something outside today! Even cleaned out the wood pellet stove (you have to empty the ashes and scrape the inner surfaces off roughly once a week or so). Of course, that meant the stove was off for a half hour or so, but that was okay.
Before I get to my opinion of ‘Get Out’ that I promised last time, I have a health update. You read my complaint a few posts ago about being sick for weeks. That particular illness I was sleeping like 12 hours a night, for a while. I finally felt like I kicked it a couple weeks ago. Well, New Year’s Day I woke up with a scratchy throat. I’m thinking “here we go again.” Felt okay though, so went the NYD ‘Doke Appreciation’ hash, which was short and sweet. The next day, felt a little worse. That night, woke up, throat on fire. Swallowing hurt like hell. Throat hurt like hell. Called the doc as soon as I got up and got an appt for that afternoon. Went in there, and he was like, man, your throat is red! The gland on the side of my neck was visible. And needless to say my throat was swollen. He was surprised I wasn’t “writhing in pain” and asked me if I wanted pain meds. He also told me if my breathing started making a “hoooo” noise to get to the ER immediately because my throat was closing up. (very comforting). Anyway, I am now on prednisone (my first foray into taking it) and antibiotics. I felt 100% better the next morning. I am forcing myself to not do all the stuff I want to do (like hashing today) and take it easy. So far so good.
So, “Get Out.” Well, it is not what the commercials would lead you to believe. Honestly I’m not sure if I liked it. It was … okay. I don’t think it’s Oscar worthy. Just my opinion.
Last night I watched “The Big Sick.” I like Kumail Nanjiani – he’s pretty funny. His thing about taking apart his dad’s VCR is hilarious! The movie was decent too. Thumbs up!
In cooking news, I made a chickpea flatbread this week. What an easy thing to make. Tasty, easy, good protein. Look it up!
After doing some clothing testing for my Norway trip, I discovered that my current gloves aren’t going to cut it. I got an email from EMS (Eastern Mountain Sports) that a bunch of their stuff was 40% so I found a pair of gloves with high ratings that were on sale. Tried them out this week. Hallelujah! They come with liners and I didn’t even need them (actually the gloves were warmer without them). Now I need to figure out if I need a balaclava or not.
This post’s gratuitous photos include a glass of “Magenta Dragon” (a hard cider) from Liquid Alchemy – a mead and cider brewery in Delaware:
It was delicious! And so pretty!
And, a photo of Kenn, learning something from one of his FB friends:
That’s all for now peeps. Stay tuned for the next post!