Winter blues

A little over a week ago someone on the radio said the most depressing thing: that up to that point, we'd only gotten 11 minutes of sunshine all month. I'm sure that number has changed since then, but what hasn't changed is the fact that this February has been a miserable one.

E.g.:

• My damn window won't close all the way shut. I've had to sleep in a parka on some nights. One cold night before bed I put my contact lenses in a case and left it on my desk by the window. By the next morning, the contact lens solution in the case had turned into ice! My contact lenses were trapped inside of ice cubes! That crazy window. At least my computer's CPU was happy.
• I'm sick. Not balls-hanging-to-my-knees sick, but sick enough that I can't go two sentences without coughing. What really cracks me up is that my office at work is the last door at the end of a long hallway, and as I walk past each door, half of the rooms are vacant because of people going home sick while the other half contains frustrated, coughing coworkers. Everybody's pissed at me, because guess who doesn't cover his mouth when he coughs?
• Yo I can't get over the fact that I physically can't shut my window, not even by standing on the sash. Do you know how that feels? It's like going to a party and being unable to open up a Miller Lite bottle so you bust out your key chain beer bottle opener and then someone looks at you funny and is all, "Umm... isn't that a twist-off?" I'm not speaking from experience.
• Last thing about my window, I promise. Caulking it with socks and kleenex has made life a little warmer, but there's no stopping that obnoxious high-pitched whistling, which would be awesome if it sounded like that song Daryl Hannah was whistling at the hospital in Kill Bill, or better yet if it sounded like singing Ewoks, or even better yet if it sounded like Mariah Carey doing that thing at the end of Emotions. But no, it sounds like a boiling tea kettle of all things.
• Even if we were getting good amounts of sun, I'd never see it. Such is the life of an office drone.

Why is it that every year, without fail, groundhogs see their own shadows? Where you at, Global Warming? Good thing I'm going to be in Florida all weekend visiting my old friend Melanie, who's been begging me to come visit ever since her wedding last year. I called her up just now to make sure she was picking me up at the airport, and at the end of the conversation she was all, "It's about time you came down here to Florida!" and while stuffing another napkin into the opening of my frigid cold window, I told her I couldn't agree more.