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.

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!!

1.  Getting extensive help from a tradesman on home renovations. 
If a man goes into a place like Home Depot to ask questions about how to install a toilet, he will most likely receive a ‘harrumph!’ and only be pointed towards the plumbing aisle. 

If a woman goes in alone to ask such questions, either dressed to kill in a power suit or covered in paint while wearing oversized coveralls, all her questions are answered in detail.  And then the toilet is carried out to her car for her without her requesting the service.

2.  Lifting only light things while helping friends move. 
To achieve this, a woman merely has to say, “I’m just a girl.  I can’t lift that heavy couch!  I’ll take the pillows though.”  Men immediately feel remorseful for nearly putting a woman in harm’s way; which results in the women only have to move the fake plants, picture frames, and bedding out of the house.  It’s win-win.  Right?

3.  Going to the washroom with a group of friends. 
It is 100% acceptable for a whole group of women to go to the washroom together, even if there is only one stall.  They get to chat in line, ensure everyone still looks ok, and gossip about the men in the group without them ever knowing about it.  Society forces men to go alone and not have someone there to tell him about the toilet paper stuck to his shoe.

If I man said, “Hey Joe, Fred, and James – want to go to the washroom with me?”, he would  no longer be friends with Joe, Fred, and James.

4.  Playing dumb to get a man to do something for you. 
All women have this ability and men continually fall for it.  When a woman’s tire goes flat on the side of the road, she could heft out the tire iron and get to work, but why?  A more than happy to help man will stop do it for you if you simply act confused.

This doesn’t work for men.  Can you imagine what the response would be if a man threw his arms up in abandon and giggled while fumbling with a tire iron?  I am sure the response would be something like, “What the *$&#! is your problem man?  Get a grip.”  Then the helpful man would drive off in a rush only to leave the confused man with a flat tire on the side of the road.

5.   Chocolate, glass of wine, and shopping with good friends fix most anything. 
Women can have most of their life problems fixed by eating some good chocolate, sipping a great glass or wine, or going shoe shopping with their best girlfriends.  Not a darn thing was done to fix anything, but some how the problem is way less of an issue. 

Men’s problems are never solved by a heartfelt talk while purchasing a gorgeous stiletto heel.

So maybe women have to shave their legs, can’t have grey hair, have to stay fit, and may need Botox to get rid of their crow’s feet; but they have a lot going for them that men don’t.  Just don’t tell the men!

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.

Lately, I am totally irresponsible.  I’m not doing crazy things likes shopping for shoes every day or anything.  I am merely a night owl.  At about 8:00 I find myself getting sleepy, and then at about 8:15 I get a huge burst of energy.

This is when I clean the house, write proposals, catch up on email, knit a sweater, tile my kitchen, install a toilet, or bake large quantities of brownies to eat that evening.  I find myself wide awake and coming up with amazing ideas, only to find it’s 1 am.

So I go to bed.  And lay there thinking about my latest great idea, wondering why I am still awake and if the alarm clock will understand I don’t actually hate it when I hit it for the 15^th snooze when it rings in 4 hours.

Night Owl-itis is a vicious cycle to get in.  I see no end in sight as I am merely starting up for the evening.  Pan of brownies anyone?

HELP!