1. Shock. No one believes it when you casually mention that on your birthday it was -46.1 Celsius, making it nearly the coldest place on the planet that day. AND that you still worked out, went out for lunch with friends, and spent the day shopping. It seems too epic to be real.

2. Boots. You need boots to live here and more than one pair. It is completely practical and rational to have at least 10 pairs of boots to go with all your outfits. I have yet to arrive as I only have 8 pairs. At least living in the arctic gives you good reason to go shoe shopping!

Tsubo, Nine West, Eject, Miss Mooz, Cougar, and London Fly you keep my feet oh so happy and warm!

3. Christmas Pounds. There is no hurry to shed the extra pounds gained over Christmas from eating scads of unhealthy foods while visiting with friends and family. Many layers, large coats, and heavy sweaters are required so you don’t die from exposure.
Is that muffin top 10 Christmas pounds or a bulky sweater…hmmmm….

4. Appreciation. When summer finally comes around there is a deep appreciation for warm weather, the ability to wear a tank top without dying, and sunlight. We are extremely grateful that we don’t have to plug in our cars, wear long underwear under our suits, or go to work and come home in the dark.

5. Winter Sports. Now I am not an outside dweller in the winter, but I married one. Skiing, speed skating, and ice hockey only require sports equipment and either your backyard or a friend’s. Fun times are literally just around the corner. Or for me, just in a coffee shop!

What do you like about dwelling in the arctic?

I did not leap out of bed at 5 am to go work out.

I slept in and was late.  No Green Monster smoothie for me.

The grouchiness settled in and nothing good could come out of today.

After all it’s Monday.

All of my Mondays tend to be horrible, no good, very bad days for no reason in particular.  I am apparently hardcoded to have a bad day on the first day of the week.

Until today.

Today is possibly the best Monday I’ve ever had.

I came in to work to see this at my desk.

A very large box of mystery...

Upon opening it, a very exciting box winked up at me.

Oh my gracious! A Tsubo boot box...can it be?!

My FREE boots from Sally McGraw’s contest had arrived!

Aren’t they gorgeous?!

Fabulous, fabulous boots! I can't believe that they are mine!I think my desk should look like this every day.

Thank you Tsubo and Sally McGraw, you have changed the landscape of my Mondays forever.

I guess all a woman needs is a free pair of boots to make Mondays fabulous.

Such a happy Monday....so happy I can't covertly take a good picture of myself while holding the boots at my desk. I didn't want the men to catch me taking photos of my shoes. They already think I am kinda out of my mind...this would just confirm their suspicions.

What would make your Monday fabulous ?

When I am 100 I want to be able to walk on my own, know who I am without having to be reminded, and laugh until my stomach hurts.

This is why I am torturing myself by going to see my trainer for a near death experience once a week and eating Primal.

Do you know how hard it is to give up everything except meat, eggs, vegetables, fruits, and some dairy?

This means no brownies, chips, mac ‘n cheese, cookies, candy bars, or even popcorn.

My world is officially devoid of all comfort food.

Yesterday I desperately wanted something to ‘crunch’ while watching TV so I ate half a jar of mini dill pickles.  The crunch was satisfying, but the churning in my tummy wasn’t.

During my last training session while trying to run a mile as fast as womanly possible my calves seized.  My left leg ended up at the back of the treadmill clanging around as I tried to keep the conveyor belt from sucking it under.  Luckily I got my right leg off the belt, but it has completely seized as well.  As I fell forward in a semi-panicked state, I managed to push the ‘OFF’ button.

After limping off the treadmill and stretching out, I was told this is a direct result of wearing high heels too often.

My heart nearly broke in two.

I have given up so much already!  My new comfort food is dill pickles people!  There is no way I am giving up my shoes too.

In an act of pure defiance, I purchased a brand new pair of fabulous heels.

They are so fabulous that they almost make up for the lack of comfort food!

I see no reason to NOT wear these.  In fact, I think they just added 2 years onto my life.

They are horrible.

1. Skiing. Strapping boards to your feet, climbing thousands of feet up a steep part of a mountain, and then sliding down while trying not to die is a bad idea. Perhaps it’s because I am not sports inclined, but getting frostbite while contemplating your life with only two small poles to keep you from death is not my idea of fun.
2. White water kayaking. When you find yourself hanging upside down in the water while strapped into a small plastic boat heading straight into the rapids, you will understand. Can anyone say ‘air’?
3. Tole Painting. People look so serene and happy painting flowers, birds, and other kitschy things on wooden objects. In reality it’s a practice in learning how not to swear while doing a genteel lady’s craft. The art isn’t about painting at all, it’s actually appearing to be kind and gentle all while fighting the intense desire to harm someone.
4. Running marathons. The prestige associated with marathon runners is huge; everyone seems to revere a person that can run 26 miles straight. Don’t get me wrong, it’s completely impressive but who wants to spend 3 hours a day running around instead of drinking lattes and catching up with friends? All so that you can pay money to run in a race and get a t-shirt. Something isn’t adding up for me.
5. Martha Stewart recipes. Martha is a horrible, vindictive woman that is not on the everyday woman’s team. She creates fabulous magazines with beautiful pictures of food that seem attainable. What she fails to tell you is each recipe requires at least one ingredient that can’t be sourced unless you have black market connections and at the end of your 3 hour meticulous baking extravaganza you will only have 24 odd looking cookies to show for all your hard work.
6. Canning. Take at least one whole day of your life, cut vegetables or fruit for 6 hours, shove them into jars, and then cook them in a huge vat on your stove for hours on end. After 12 hours, your house is hotter than a sauna and you’ve used up all your energy for the week. The only reason to can anything is if you don’t have a grocery store within 200 kms of your house.
7. Pedicures. I love shoes and am a known shoe-aholic. I need those calluses to be able to wear all my shoes and don’t want to pay someone money to touch my feet for an hour and make all my shoes painful to wear. It’s just a bad idea.
8. Swimsuit shopping. Whenever a girl plans a trip to a tropical place, a new swimsuit is required. It seems like fun to go get a cute new suit for your trip until you are standing underneath florescent lights with all your cottage cheese, droopiness, and muffin top hanging out for the world to see. All of the sudden it is clear why some women opt for muumuus instead of bikinis.
9. Riding the teacups. Going to the fair is always fun and nostalgic, and at times the nostalgia can get you into trouble. You find yourself thinking that riding the childhood rides is a good idea. Halfway into the teacup ride while trying to hold down your chili dog and caramel apple you remember why the dizzying ride is only good for people under the age of 12.
10. Gardening. It seems romantic to till the earth, plant seeds, and watch the fruits of your labor grow. After fighting weeds, rocks, drought, and bugs for 8 weeks all you have to show for your labor of love are 8 tomatoes, 4 zucchinis, and 7 ears of sad looking corn. The lettuce comes in right away, but is out of season by the time your meager amount of tomatoes and zucchini are ready to be eaten. Since you have to go to the grocery store anyways for veggies for the lettuce, why not skip the stress of the garden and leave the veggie growing to the professionals?

If you are thinking about attempting any of these things, I suggest you don’t.

What is on your list of things that look fun but aren’t?

I disagree.

We are the most gullible people in the world.

Today the high temperature is -30 Celsius. Since when is a high a negative number? This would be similar to a high jumper bragging about his new record breaking jump, only to hear this explanation: “Well, I ran up to the pole and just fell over. It was awesome.”

Somehow when it came time to split up the continent, the Canadians decided the pretty fluffy white stuff up North was better than the beaches, palm trees, ocean, and temperate weather or were severely drugged. I hope beyond all hope they were severely drugged.

Maybe we are nice because we are just happy not to be dead after braving the elements to go to work or get food from the grocery store.

It tends to make me grumpy though.

Where's the beach? I'm COLD.

In -30 Celsius weather, the following things happen:

• Nose hairs freeze within 1 second of being outside. Make sure not to have flared nostrils when braving the elements, otherwise your nose is frozen into place.
• If you decide to not wear mittens, within two minutes you have to look to see if you still have a hand. It quickly becomes a frozen, lifeless lump of flesh that clangs together without any feeling. This is a bad thing.
• Air gets trapped in your lungs and you can barely breathe. In order to breathe, a scarf must be wrapped around your mouth and nose.
• Vehicles must be plugged in so they start. Then the environment is severely harmed by letting the car idle for about 20 minutes before driving anywhere.
• A massive brain freeze occurs from the cold air hitting your forehead. It’s the same exact feeling you get from eating ice cream too fast, but there is no rocky road in your tummy.
• 14 layers of clothing are required to leave the house and you to tell yourself that Oompa Loompa really is the fashion statement this winter.
• Glass wearers suffer more than non-glasses wearers. When a glasses wearer comes inside to escape the frigid temperatures, nothing can been seen for quite some time due to extreme fogging.

All fogged up. Can't see a darn thing!

Where else is being outside a matter of life and death? In hot countries you may become dehydrated, but you aren’t going to die within 20 minutes of being left out in the elements. During a Canadian cold snap this is a reality.

In this weather it is safe to assume the man on the side of the road with a broken car does in fact need help and is not pulling a Ted Bundy scam.

Perhaps that is why we are so nice, if we didn’t help each other out more of us would die.

At least I get to wear fun boots in the snow. This is the only positive of the whole weather fiasco in Canada; fun boots and accessories!

Cute pink boots help make the cold a teeny bit better...and I can still feel my toes!

How are you keeping warm today? If you’re cold and the temperature is above 0 Celsius, please consider yourself to be in paradise!

Brrr!!

She has failed me in every way.

Even after giving birth, she still remains muffin top free.  If she had a muffin top and was confident about it, all women everywhere would be liberated.

Angelina, use your power for good to liberate the everyday woman!!

My faith in Angelina to champion the everyday woman was so great that I wasn’t overly concerned about my muffin top.  After all, I love being fashionable and was prepared with my muffin top when it came to be the next big thing in haute couture.

To be ready for Angelina’s show of daring, I didn’t worry about my random consumption of M&Ms, Doritos, white bread, pastries, and candy.  After all, I didn’t want to get sick trying to get the muffin top back when it became fashionable to have one.

The time has never come.  After 4 years of hoping, I now realize that it’s never going to happen.

No matter how much I go to the gym or try to rid myself of the muffin top, it goes everywhere with me.  There are things women can do to hide the muffin top, such as wear ‘foundational undergarments’ that are akin to a straight jacket.  Unfortunately, I think it’s important to be able to breathe and sit down without looking like you’ve pulled every muscle in your back so I opted against wearing them.

While thinking about how to overcome my metabolism that is slower than a slug’s, I had an epiphany.  I completed a good old-fashioned Google search and found professional help.  Tomorrow is my first appointment for personal training with a man that ‘helps you look good naked’.  I chose him because he’s the closest thing I could find for ‘Muffin Top Slayer’.

So I may be dead after tomorrow afternoon, but if Angelina isn’t going to come through for me I have to change my tactic.

If you can’t beat ‘em, join ‘em.  SIGH.

For awhile I led a one woman campaign against the wearing of nylons by refusing to wear them, no matter how cold it was outside.  It could be -40 Celsius outside and I would still refuse to wear them.

Then some of my running women from the YMCA pointed me towards tights.  It’s the lesser of two evils, but still evil nonetheless.  To be fair to tights, they rarely run when you snag them and have a greater resistance to gravity, but I still hate them.

Why doesn’t society force men to wear hosiery under their clothing that sometimes goes up to their armpits and creates havoc on their whole day?

It’s just not fair.

Yesterday I broke down and wore tights with my cute Kenneth Cole dress and Jump red boots. The only reasons I opted for tights was because the dress is shorter than I usually wear to work and it’s winter up here in the arctic.

Boy, am I glad I decided to be a proper woman in society!

There I was walking downtown with one of my male co-workers; portfolio in one hand and a cup of hot, hot coffee in the other.  Suddenly a gust of wind picked up the hem of my cute Kenneth Cole dress and I became Marilyn Monroe for a moment.

I always thought it would be fun to have a Marilyn moment, but not when you’re working and don’t have the ability to keep the dress in place due to your hands being full.  If this happens, you become a screaming woman with a dress flying up in your face while squatting to the ground in an attempt to blend into the concrete. 

Just so you know, the screaming and squatting just makes it worse. 

As quickly as the wind came up, it died down.

I handed the coffee to my bemused co-worker, straightened my dress out, and asked that he carry the coffee to the car so that another ridiculous event didn’t happen.

I was just glad I was wearing black tights.  They made it a smidgen less awkward when the wind made an attempt to show off my fuchsia underwear. 

From this day forward, I won’t curse tights; I will wear them with thankfulness in my heart.

I can already hear you asking.  How can I be friends with an inanimate object?

Because it may just give me free shoes…gorgeous, gloriously free shoes.

I have the chance to design shoes with Jeffrey Campell and win lovely, suede, over the knee boots  from ShoeHunting just for giving my opinion.

And I am ALWAYS up for giving my opinion…who knew I could get free boots for doing so?

This may be my dream come true.

Knit or crochet swimsuits, especially bikinis.

I am a knitter, and am apt to buy yarn without a purpose just because it’s a one of a kind blend or hand dyed. I am not against fiber arts in the least. I just don’t think that knitting or crocheting this garment is a good idea. There are just WAY too many issues with it.

• Holes. Hand knit and crochet projects have HOLES in them. Perhaps there are women out there that wouldn’t mind the holes, but most women know exactly why the holes would be a problem.
• Water. Have you ever pulled a wet sweater out of the washing machine? If so, you know that it doesn’t keep its shape and stretches out quite quickly. A woman wearing such a swimsuit would have to avoid contact with water at all costs, a feat rarely accomplished while at the beach.
• Itch. Most garments made out of wool are known to be somewhat itchy. Why would a woman want to endure such itchiness? I suppose if the thing was knit out of an alpaca blend it could be ok. But then why spend all that money on a bathing suit that has holes and will stretch out if it gets wet?
• Sand. If you were to get sand in the fibers, how would you get it out? Just thinking about this is making my brow furrow. The amount of irritation that the swimsuit wearer would have to endure while wearing the suit…!
• Elasticity. I am just making an assumption here, but most women want their bathing suit to STAY ON. Sweaters aren’t known for their elasticity…so my question is, “How the heck are those things staying on?”
• Ridiculousness. This may be pretty obvious, but they look completely out of place on the beach with all the normal suits. It’s fine to make a fashion statement, just not this one.

I don’t mean to offend if you have a knit bikini, I just need to ask – How do you do it? I suppose if its never worn to the beach or to swim in, it would be fine.

Perhaps this is one of those ‘catwalk only‘ kind of outfits…