Monday, January 24, 2011

Explain This To Me.

I walked home from Mer's place this morning without my mittens and after about five minutes I was convinced one of my fingers might fall off from the cold. It was a genuine concern. To combat this, I shoved my hands into the pockets of my jeans. 
No good. The thumbs were still out and still freezing. Need my thumbs. How else would I make hang ten symbols or hit the space bar when I type?

Next I tried cupping my hands and blowing into them as fast as I could without stopping. I figured a constant supply of heat would balance out the ridiculously cold weather. This was a good thought but ruined after a few blocks when I started to get dizzy.
 
I then tried a combo platter of rubbing my hands together, blowing when I felt like I could, pockets, and tae-bo punching moves to keep the circulation going. I don't have to tell you what this looked like, but it's interesting to note that one man crossed to the other sidewalk to stay away from me. 

With no other options, I unzipped my jacket enough so I could hold my hands near my armpits, Mary Katherine Gallagher style. Pressing my arms close to my body to try to warm up my little fingers, I ran the rest of the way home. If you have the chance, try to run with your hands in your armpits. It's not easy. 

Anyway, when I got home I checked weather.com to see how cold it was outside and it said zero degrees. 
Then in a smaller font, feels like -20.  

Right.
Can we all come together on the "feels like" temperature thing? If it FEELS LIKE negative 20 degrees, then you know what? It's twenty below. That's like a store trying to sell a cashmere sweater that feels like polyester. If it's itchy and rough, that's what it is. You can't call it cashmere and say, "feels like polyester." Why are we still stuck on the two temperatures thing? No one ever remembers the actual temperature. On days like today all you ever hear is, "But it feels like..." Or, "Yeah but with the wind chill...." Or, "Hey, can I put my fingers in your armpit so they don't fall off?" 
Stuff like that.

I don't know if any of this makes sense. My head is defrosting. 

3 comments:

andrea is rumored to have said...

i used this yesterday in elevator conversation splint. a feller said to me, getting cold out there huh. i said, yes did you know it FEELS LIKE negative twenty in boston? such a funny point jess! i think the issue would be even worse though if people did the "feels like" in celsius

Jess said...

shin splint. you're good.

i wear my boxing sweatshirt everyday and miss your face.

ness said...

"she'll see it later Clark, her eyes are frozen"