Why I Love Winter, Why I Hate Winter, and My Vendetta Against One Mr. Shart Enamorado

As I recently mentioned, my nice camera just up and died on me. I'd been researching/pricing out a new model, but figured we'd deal with it after the holidays. My husband and I had agreed not to exchange gifts during Chanukah this year, and focus only on stuff for the kids, but as it turned out, he interpreted that agreement as "okay, no gifts, except for this fancy new camera. Here." SON OF A BITCH, man. Remind me to tell you (if I haven't already...eh, who can remember?) about the time we were exchanging gifts early on in our relationship, and I got him a toothbrush, and he got me a diamond necklace. He is so lucky to have me!

The camera is the Canon Digital Rebel XSi, which is a step up from my last one, and I've been playing with it ever since it came into my life last night. And here's where it gets embarrassing, because I was almost weeping with joy at this sweet gesture, and having a good camera again, so I felt this, like, Strong Photographic Responsibility, one that compelled me to take Noteworthy Artistic Photographs of Depth and Meaning. Which is hilarious, because I am in no way a photographer and perhaps more importantly, don't really know how a camera works. But still! I persevered, and FORCED MYSELF TO ACTUALLY START TAKING NOTEWORTHY ARTISTIC PHOTOGRAPHS OF DEPTH AND MEANING. you know, for the sake of my craft. Because I'm nothing if not a giant douche.

~These wee teacups represent man's inhumanity to man, and also the fleeting nature of childhood in a postmodern world. Yes.~

Fortunately, I quickly gave up on this endeavor, because a shitton of snow fell upon our fair city, and the kids did that charming thing where they beg to go play in it, and we spend 27 minutes bundling them up, only to spend four actual minutes outdoors. Like I said, charming. We did, however, manage to capture this:

~The hats, puffy coats, snow, and gloves represent that it's really quite effing cold.~

I'm still feeling all sweet towards the pretty, pretty snow, but I should point out that I have snow-related amnesia, wherein I initially get all giddy about it, like that dog from that commercial with the bacon! BACON!!!! (only I'm all "Snow! SNOW! SNOWWWWWW!"), only to remember the next day that I hate snow and it sucks and one time a few winters ago, I lost my shoe in a deceptively deep slushpuddle coming home from work the day after a snow storm, and a bunch of servers at a restaurant adjacent to the slushpuddle pointed and laughed at me until one of them came out to retrieve my shoe using a broomhandle and I tried to TIP HIM A DOLLAR for his trouble, like, I don't know, it seemed like a good idea, and he got insulted and then I hobbled-- along with my shoe squelch, squelch, squelching dirty frozen water, giving me probable frostbite and DEFINITE FOOT DISEASES-- right into a conveniently-located Nine West, and then I came home with my new shoes, and J was all, "ENOUGH WITH THE RIDICULOUS EXCUSES. FIRST YOUR SHOE FELL IN THE TOILET WHILE YOU WERE FLUSHING IT WITH YOUR FOOT, NOW ANOTHER ONE FELL IN A PUDDLE? STOP COMING UP WITH REASONS TO BUY SHOES, MY GOD," and I was like, "no! This time I actually DID need the shoes!" and I still haven't forgiven the season of Winter, basically.

Finally, you'll notice that I have enabled word verification in my comments. I did this because I'm getting slammed with random Japanese mystery comment spam. Perhaps they learned about my love of sushi, karaoke, and Kasugai gummi candy? I do not know. And while I cannot deny the hilarity of comment spam coming from someone with the email address "Shart Enamorado"...



...it's annoying, is what it is. I'm hoping I'll only need to keep this up for a brief while, and I'm sorry, because who wants to type EXTRA WORDS? Pleh. Sorry. DAMN YOU TO HELL, SHART ENAMORADO.