Little Cures for the January Blahs

Even though the holidays and the new year with its shiny new glow aren't too far behind me, the January blahs have hit, and they've hit me hard.  January is a yucky month at work: the final push of the last semester.  I'm trying to cover the rest of the curriculum, finish all of the term marking that I neglected over the holidays, write exams, do report cards and then prepare for the new semester in February.  It's a busy but not fun time, and of course, I am dealing with the mountain of work by procrastinating.

On top of that, the weather's been atrocious.  I had my fingers cross for an extreme wind chill day today, or even a snow day yesterday, but that didn't happen.  The Toronto boards rarely declare snow days: I've had one in almost ten years of teaching here.  Even with the awful weather, my thinking was highly wishful.

As I was blah-ing home from work, I realized that I needed to make myself an internal happy list of things that make me feel better in this cold, dark, month that's void of any real fun.  Here's what I've brainstormed.

1) My Hunter boots with fleece lining: I don't know what it's like to have wet or cold feet anymore!  My Hunters are one of my best purchases ever.

2) Hot Chocolate - even though I'm trying to avoid the white stuff (sugar), an evening mug is my one allowance at the end of the day

3) Exercise - because I was sick this weekend and yesterday (and it was too cold last night to leave my place), I went three days without exercising.  I was in a foul mood after work today, but I went to the gym and had a great workout and I feel so much better.  Even the vast influx of new year's resolutioners didn't annoy me too much.

4) Books - I'll always have books.

5) Trip planning - last night, a couple of friends and made plans to have a tri-blogger conference in St. Louis at a Cardinals game over the long weekend in May.  It looks like I'll be booking my flight shortly. 

Also, I started browsing March Break flights into London and out of Paris.  I'll be booking that soon too. 

6) Sleep - I love a good sleep.  Since it's too cold to go out, I can sleep more.

7) The Bachelor this season is rather hawt.  That's my love-to-hate show and I'm glad it's back. 

8) The fact that it's now less than six weeks until a long weekend in February.

Hurrah!  I feel a little less blah now.