Temps are backing down...they never back down.

Go ahead and make your jokes, Mr. Jokey...

I've been feeling good.  I've been hitting the gym regularly.  Tracking my Cal on myfitnesspal is keeping me honest and I'm pretty sure I've dropped (maaaybe) 5 lbs?  (Amazing.  And all this time my frustration with working out was that I wasn't really losing weight when all along I was eating too much?!?  Fancy the f#ck that?!?)  I'm hitting karate 2-3 days a week and fixing to test for my brown belt.  And my cross-training elliptical/treadmill stuff has made the few times I can run outside in the winter...nice.  I've covered 5-6 miles and wasn't even laid up.

However...

I've re-established that it's approximately February 17th is my "Officially Done with this Winter Bullshit"...date.  At that point my mood is adversely affected and I stop wondering when I'll get to go sledding or skating and actively want to punch Jack Frost in the fleshy patch.   One year ago I was on a brunch date and we were able to traipse up and down Selby avenue in light jackets and sat in a sun-puddle while drinking coffee and getting to know each other.

Now?  Hey look...I'm still all for getting a few more inches of powder on the ground.  Gods know we need the precipitation.  But when I get home and my roommate is cackling that we're hitting another sub-zero deep freeze for a few days?  Something...something very deep inside me snaps and cries and dies a little.   Hope relents, and even little joys like the fact that my early-ass commute is now tinged with light blue sun versus bleak black cannot alleviate my misery.

This might sound melodramatic if you're a non-Minnesotan...and you may question my heartiness as a resident or (gasp) knee-jerk-off the old comment "It's Winter in Minnesota! <smack>  Whaddya exPECT?!?!".    Well eat a groomed wang.   I'm being robbed of my motivation.  Because right now, the only thing the cold has done for me is want to sleep...

...and skip the stupid gym...
...and order take-out...
...and drink an entire bottle of sweet Shiraz...
...and watch "The Running Man" before going BACK to bed...

Fuck you, sub-zero temps.  Back to the shadows, with you.  I'm tired of this abusive cold.

I'm not on your lawn, Old Man Winter.  And I'm about to send you to an assisted living facility.