5 Things I Hate To Do When It’s (this) Cold

For those that have listened to me on the radio, it certainly is no secret that I despise winter – and especially the bitter cold snap that has hit  Western Colorado. Why do I hate winter so much?Well, the reasons are many, but I have narrowed the list down to 5 things I hate to do in the cold.

1) Crawling Out of Bed – Normally, I’m an early riser – get up and get going. But when it is this cold, it is a struggle to crawl out from the warmth of the bed into the chilly morning air. On the positive side, I suppose I’m getting more sleep, but I'm losing an hour of activity from my day.

2) Getting Out of the Shower – Even in the spring and summer, the first 30 seconds after shutting the shower water off is unquestionably the most unpleasant experience of the entire day. When the temperature outside is zero, and the bathroom temperature is in the 60s, this unpleasant experience is 10 times worse.The dread of facing these few shivering moments is enough to cause me to linger in the hot shower a few minutes longer. (No wonder my water and gas bill is so high.)

3) Scooping Poop – I have two dogs. They eat, they sleep, they poop. And just because the ground is frozen and the temperature is in the single digits, they don’t take a break from these three essential functions. For one thing, I hate having to be out in the cold doing the clean up. But the real issue is that with snow on the ground, everything is frozen – solid. That means the simple task of SCOOPING becomes the difficult matter of chiseling and chiseling and then scooping. The consequential result is I put off the task for later – I'll wait for a warm up.Well,  then it’s worse because there’s even more "stuff" to clean up.

4) Driving to Work – My truck is old. Real old. It turns 22 this year. The heater isn’t what it used to be – for various reasons. If the outside temperature is at least in the 20s, it will at the least  warm to an almost lukewarm temperature. Get into the single digits,though, and it does nothing but blow cold air for 15 minutes all the way to work. Maybe the solution is to start coming in to work at 2:00 in the afternoon after it's warmed up a bit. Or maybe I should just start spending the night in my office so then I won’t have to drive to work when it’s 2 below.

5) Going to the Gym – Keeping in mind the condition of the aforementioned Chevy truck, driving to the gym is not fun. Nor is all that pleasurable to come out of the gym after a good work out only to have the biting chill of winter stinging your face, and sending shivers through your body now wet with sweat. Consequentially, what happens is I tend not to even go. I get home from work in the evening and I have no interest in venturing back out into the cold. I’m in to stay – layers of clothes, snuggled in my recliner, and sipping deliciously hot coffee.

Just 70 more days until Spring.