It's been a while since my last post and while not a lot has happened... it feels like there's been a lot more going on. A lot of you know that I've struggled with depression in the past... well it seems as though the excessive amounts of darkness aren't helping with that nasty little friend. About a week ago now, R was at his wit's end and pretty much forced me to reach out for help. Am I ever glad he did. More frequent phone calls home, what feels like a million vitamins later and some friendly questions for the people I deal with on a daily basis are helping, as will the sun lamp that mum's having shipped here. As always, baking and cooking really do seem to help so I've been making a point to play in the kitchen at least twice a week.
Darkness is now the norm here. I'm lucky enough to have a job that allows me to walk home during the brief period of daylight, but most aren't nearly so fortunate. R walks to and from work in the dark- he sees the sunshine on his lunch hours and on the weekends. You wouldn't think it'd be such a huge deal but to put this in perspective... After I did a quick jaunt to work this morning I was walking home and watching the sunrise. At 9:35am. Sunset was a mere 5 hours and 43 minutes later, yeah, at 3:18pm. Tomorrow, our day will be roughly 4 minutes shorter than it was today.
Darkness is now the norm here. I'm lucky enough to have a job that allows me to walk home during the brief period of daylight, but most aren't nearly so fortunate. R walks to and from work in the dark- he sees the sunshine on his lunch hours and on the weekends. You wouldn't think it'd be such a huge deal but to put this in perspective... After I did a quick jaunt to work this morning I was walking home and watching the sunrise. At 9:35am. Sunset was a mere 5 hours and 43 minutes later, yeah, at 3:18pm. Tomorrow, our day will be roughly 4 minutes shorter than it was today.
I have a chart posted by our front door, it tracks the sunrise/sunset times as well as a number of other random little tidbits... if anyone's interested, the majority of the data came from here.
So, as the days have been getting shorter they've also been getting progressively colder... with the exception of the last three days of course! I leave the house around 5:10am every morning so that I can be at my cafe by 5:25am... which also happens to be the coldest part of the day/night (I have yet to decide if it counts as day or night yet...). The coldest I've braved so far was -28 C + the windchill and apparently winter's only getting started. I was SO excited this past Friday, it was a balmy -8 (that's right, single digits!) when I left my house... and slowly got colder through the day. By the time I got home it was hovering around -15. Brrr.
Something that a lot of people simply don't realize is that it actually has to be somewhat warm(ish) for it to snow. At -28 the snow squeaks and crackles under your feet as you walk. Your hair freezes if it's exposed to the air anywhere below -18. I've been rocking the Rogue look fairly often recently... it's really not intentional. If you're outside with jeans on for more than 10 minutes on anywhere below -15, you're going to have what looks like a sunburn on your legs when you start to warm up. If it was below -25, it feels like a sunburn too. Snow simply won't fall below -20. Hoar frost is gorgeous but it means your walk home is going to be on the frosty side. When it's REALLY cold, dryer vents look like they're blowing crystals... oh and ice crystals in the air? They make rainbows.
Oh the random things you learn living north of the 60th parallel.
So, as the days have been getting shorter they've also been getting progressively colder... with the exception of the last three days of course! I leave the house around 5:10am every morning so that I can be at my cafe by 5:25am... which also happens to be the coldest part of the day/night (I have yet to decide if it counts as day or night yet...). The coldest I've braved so far was -28 C + the windchill and apparently winter's only getting started. I was SO excited this past Friday, it was a balmy -8 (that's right, single digits!) when I left my house... and slowly got colder through the day. By the time I got home it was hovering around -15. Brrr.
Something that a lot of people simply don't realize is that it actually has to be somewhat warm(ish) for it to snow. At -28 the snow squeaks and crackles under your feet as you walk. Your hair freezes if it's exposed to the air anywhere below -18. I've been rocking the Rogue look fairly often recently... it's really not intentional. If you're outside with jeans on for more than 10 minutes on anywhere below -15, you're going to have what looks like a sunburn on your legs when you start to warm up. If it was below -25, it feels like a sunburn too. Snow simply won't fall below -20. Hoar frost is gorgeous but it means your walk home is going to be on the frosty side. When it's REALLY cold, dryer vents look like they're blowing crystals... oh and ice crystals in the air? They make rainbows.
Oh the random things you learn living north of the 60th parallel.
20 days until we leave for Ontario... I can't wait. I do really love it here, for the most part... I just need a little dose of civilization. | SO! On to happier things... Today we checked out a butcher shop at the suggestion of one of R's new friends... and I'm in love. The first thing I saw when I walked in the door was a cleaned, wrapped and frozen arctic char that was about the length of my arm.... and it was all up hill from there. We ended up picking up some hot pepperoni (which are DELICIOUS, we ate one with cheese earlier), some hot sausages and a little prime rib roast which I'll turn into a roast beef dinner this Sunday. And! Our humidifier has arrived! It ran for a few hours in an attempt to bring the humidity in this place up past 30... and it succeeded! They say it should take a couple days for your skin etc to start to feel good again but it was almost immediate for us. I can't wait to see what kind of an effect this new fangled thing called humidity has on the plants... perhaps we won't have to mist them 4-6 times per day anymore? You may think this was overkill but... my beloved lemon thyme dried to death despite the misting. Soil was happy, it was getting enough light... the leaves simply kept drying out. The fern was going to be next... but we're pretty sure the humidifier will help. *Sigh.* The things we do for our plants. |