Snoozy Sunday

Last night we watched Fargo on DVD. I can remember a time when I thought that movie had soooooo much snow. Surrounded as we are with snow mountains (yes, still, after over a day of rain and temperatures well over freezing), the film's white landscape was quite comical. Ours is way, way worse.

Correction: ours is egregious.

In recent days the change in the light and the sun's direction and the calls of the birds have been noticeable and significant, awakening in me illogical inklings of spring.

But, in the woods people are now tapping maple trees, an irrefutable sign of a seasonal shift. So is turning the clocks forward, although it doesn't feel right to do it so early.

We had windstorms all night and into the morning.

I've been gathering online recipes for Chocolate Molten Lava Cake. To actually make it I'd need ramekins, and heaven only knows where mine might be.

Chocolate is definitely on the brain. For weeks I've been mainlining Nutella by the spoonful. Why? It's medicinal. Seriously! So are Thin Mints. Didn't you know that?

For Lent I didn't give up chocolate or sweets. I gave up limoncello, an enormous sacrifice, and swearing.

And shopping. I was slow to realise I'd given up shopping. I hadn't even noticed until a few days ago, on my birthday, when I needed to shop. It felt so unfamiliar, hunting among the snow piles for a parking space, and strolling from car park to store. Thinking it over, I felt I should belatedly declare having given up shopping--for myself, in a bricks-and-mortar establishment--for Lent. Yes, I've bought things since Ash Wednesday, for other people. I got Valentine's pressies for the Chap, and a birthday gift for a chum. But these were pure and selfless acts of retail and should not count against me.

Mind you, I did shop online during Lent, for myself. I bought bare-root rose plants. Again, wholly medicinal. Therapeutic.

I shall now be determined and deliberate in my not-shopping-for-myself-in-stores-or-online-either until after Easter Day.

Admittedly, this isn't much of a hardship. All the sales flyers in the Sunday supplements show models in t-shirts and shorts and sundresses and flip-flops. Such impractical, unseasonable items have no place in my life. Not for a long while yet.

This morning I slept late but feel as if I could doze off right now. Might have something to do with the warm body of the sleeping dog pressed against my side here on the downstairs sitting room sofa. There is no more effective soporific.

A few minutes ago I IM'ed my husband, one room to another, and freaked him out.