(Empty) nesting

It’s cold outside. There is at least one foot of snow on my patio table. The dogs (not small ones) are knee-deep (do dogs have knees?) in snow when they go out.

There is a blizzard warning for tomorrow.

Time to nest.

There is nothing that I love more than curling up on the couch during the winter and watching movies, eating comfort food. The problem is that I generally love doing that with another PERSON. Hmmmm. Not gonna happen this year.

The best I can do is curl up with Killian. Now, she’s loving and cuddly and loves me unconditionally. She is, however, a black lab.

Now, I know that, this year, it’s not good to stay home alone and watch movies. I know that I need to go out and be with the world. But it’s so hard when the world is cold and snow-covered.

So here are some of my tips for fighting the winter blues .

1. I go out a lot. I meet friends for meals, I go to movies and I get out of the house. I generally do this during the day, though, rather than at night. It seems to be easier to deal with the crappy weather during the day.

2. I do things for other people.  Seems to be easier to get out if someone else is counting on me. I’m taking my mother to the dentist on Saturday. I can’t exactly cancel that, y’know?

3. Make plans in advance. When it’s left up in the air (the veritable “I’ll call you in the morning and we’ll decide”) it’s so much easier to blow it off.

4. Do something you really want to do; go to the play that you’ve been dying to see, get reservations at that great new restaurant. And if they’re expensive (and you paid in advance), so much the better.

What are your tips?

Communication tip

Here’s how I communicate with my STBXH these days.

I write him one email a day. I start it in the morning and save it as a draft. I title it with the date.

During the day, as things come to me, I add them to the email.

I revise it as I go.

Generally, I find that if I’m pissed off when I think of something (and I write it like I’m pissed off), by the time I actually send it I’ve managed to revise it so that I’m not so angry when I send it. Like, instead of saying, “I’m wondering why it takes an act of Congress to get you to contact the roofer about the leak that your daughter and I are living with and you’re not because, coward that you are, you moved out when things got rough,” I say something like, “I’d appreciate an update from the roofer you said you would contact last week.”

This way I’m not inundating him with emails and I have a record of everything I’ve emailed to him. And I don’t sound like such a pissed off bitch.