House-Sitting in Wintertime

The weather is stupid. It does not like me and is therefore trying to thwart me in many ways, by making it nearly impossible to go outside for any length of time while I am attempting to care for many chickens. Chickens who all seem to have the expectation of non-frozen water, scratch to eat, and a warm dwelling. I go outside to care for the chickens and wheeze in the winter air, then I walk the inside dog and wheeze, and then I take care of the outside dog, all while wheezing.

And did I mention that Oreo, the outside dog, is living in the mud room? Because she is there now, since it is too brutally cold and windy for her to be outside in her doghouse. And Lilly, the inside dog, is about the size of my forearm and cannot abide the cold. She has devised ways of balancing on one paw while outside, even when going to the bathroom, so to speak. It is both sad and hilarious.

The animals are miserable, and they look at me as if to say, "You are not our person. Our person would fix this. You do not have power over the weather. You are insufficient."

They are right. If I had power over the weather, it would be a balmy 75 degrees all year long, and mostly sunny. All rain would take place at night, and we would never get enough to flood the roads. We would have one annual snowfall, on Christmas Eve, resulting in a white Christmas, but the snow would quickly melt on December 26th. Snow would never stick to the roads, drift, or compact into ice.

In short, we would be living in paradise instead of a subzero arctic hellscape. No records for snowfall would be broken this year (yes, that's happening), and we would never HAVE to wear a coat, unless we wanted to for fashion purposes.

Also, there would be cake. Not in the forecast, just on the table, waiting.

I have developed a sore throat. It is wearing on me, making me less willing to put up with the weather's crap. Stupid life-ruining weather, making me have to drive in snow, making me have to shiver. Creating and then worsening a cold I would otherwise have been immune to, due to overexposure from many coughing library children.

I have decided to make a choice for the family I'm house-sitting for. The whole house, chickens, outbuildings, and dogs are going to be picked up, loaded on to many trucks, and driven down south to a warmer climate. We will return when spring arrives.

It will make things more convenient for them, I think. They'll have a shorter drive home.

Also the chickens will need sunglasses.

That is all.

Life Lessons From the Past 24 Hours

1. I cannot travel light. There are too many medicines for that, so I have left the world of jumping on a plane with only a carry-on behind me forever, because there are just too many pills for that. I look like a drug dealer when I pack, because one person under 80 cannot possibly be on so many medications, right? Wrong. Because I am on all of those medicines and somehow I managed to grow in such a way that I need them to survive. How many allergy medicines can one person take? I'm not even going to tell you. (A lot.)

2. Chickens poop on their eggs after laying them, sometimes. I don't think this is intentional, but knowing it makes the whole washing-eggs-before-you-crack-them thing make way more sense. Suddenly, the reasoning is clear. Eggs can never be clean enough. Irradiate the eggs. IRRADIATE THEM.

3. I'm not good at stairs. This isn't news, really. But I rediscovered it.

4. Cable television--or satellite--is hard to learn (and I cannot live without the internet). Setting aside the fact that Comcast is basically run by the devil in a button down shirt, the actual use of television that isn't on an antenna requires a certain amount of learning I seem to be unwilling to put into it. So I turned to the internet, but using my phone because no WiFi, and I have to say, it's hard to be internet-less.

5. I am too tall for some elliptical machines. I nearly knocked myself unconscious while running on the elliptical machine last night, because I am a giant or because the ceiling was too low or because the elliptical machine was too far off the ground to start with.  It's also possible that I hit my head not one time but four times, but we're not going to dwell on that right now.

I Am Not a Beauty Blogger, and It Shows.

This week I am responsible for chickens.*

I spent the weekend realizing that the eye cream I was using was not moisturizing my skin enough, or at all. Who can tell when it is so dry at my house and out in the world? Right now moisturizing my skin is like dumping a bottle of water on the desert sand. The water is absorbed into the sand or the cracked soil, and then it is gone as if you'd never been there with your water bottle and good intentions. I went to Ulta and came back with this:

© 2014 Benefit Cosmetics, LLC

This is It's Potent! Eye Cream from Benefit. It came highly recommended by Kate on The Small Things Blog. And I trust Kate. So, I splurged.

If anyone needs help with under-eye circles, puffiness, swelling, redness, purple-ness, SWELLING, and other unpleasant things, It's me. Also my family, but I don't take care of their under-eye circles. I only take care of mine. And believe me when I tell you, I spend most of my mornings trying to use massive amounts of concealer to hide the under-eye circles, which cannot be concealed at all because concealer hides color, but it does not hide topography.

Sometimes I wake up and think, "Was I punched in the face?" And then I realize that's just the way my skin looks.

I had been using eye serum by Simple, which is a company from the UK that I absolutely love. Jennifer introduced me to them. Their eye serum is scentless, moisturizing, and fast-absorbing, but it is not enough. Nothing is enough. I'm still using it during the daytime under makeup (yes, under makeup, Essie Button says it is okay.), but I switched it out for the Benefit at night.

So far, I'm liking the Benefit cream. Nothing hurts, I have had not spontaneous hives or chemical burns.** Its not greasy or overly fragrant, it absorbs into the skin well. It's actually providing my skin with enough moisture, too. That's a nice change. Meanwhile, I'm going to keep staring at myself in the mirror to see if it's actually decreased any puffiness or if this is just my face. This is probably just my face. But at least my skin won't be so itchy and dry anymore!

Think of me and the chickens this week, and hope with me that this cream will help me convince people that I really feel okay, and yes, I did get a good night's sleep.***

* No, really. I'm really responsible for chickens. Also two dogs. I'm sure there will be more on this later. At the very least, chicken pictures on Twitter and maybe Facebook.

** Note that hives and chemical burns HAVE occurred when using other skincare products and are the cause of my obsession with products designed for sensitive skin.

*** Lots of times, people try to convince me I'm not feeling well or that I'm not sleeping well. This is because of paleness and the under-eye circles. But really, this is just my face.