Cold Weather Blues

Good morning!

The great winter freeze of 2013 is a'pongst us, folks! I bet it's cold in your neck of the woods, too, but here in sunny Tennessee, we've reached the single digits on the thermometer. That's atypical in the extreme even for winter weather-- it hasn't been this cold in Nashville in over twenty years! You'd think I was about a million years old in that the thought of the pipes bursting or an icy route to work this morning kept me tossing and turning even in my dreams last night. However, bright and early this morning at 6 am, the wind chill was brutal but the roads clear. Here's the front yard, dotted with snow. Don't some of the houses on my street look just like Monopoly real estate?

Matthew made me some coffee and poured out cereal while I struggled to keep my eyes open in the brisk-even-indoors temperature. It is hard to wake up in an ice cold house! I set the thermostat to something like 60, because our heating and air unit is almost legal drinking age and this would be a very inopportune time for it to go out. It felt like I lived in some drafty New England farmhouse instead of a perfectly well insulated fifties' ranch. I staggered around half asleep, 90% blind, getting ready for the day. Bad as my eyes are, sometimes I wander around the house like Mr. Magoo first thing in the morning, brushing my teeth in the soothing blurriness of extreme nearsighted vision, putting on tights and sweaters and boots and all the accouterments cold weather requires with half sight. I outfitted myself as best I could -- somehow, even in January, most of my cold weather duds are still in the attic, and I've mostly just worn my regular late summer/fall clothes with a sweater over top. Today, I put on a wool skirt over my regular skirt, two shirts, and a beaded cardigan and my fur coat. After contacts, eyeliner, and lipstick, I looked like this!

The coat looks weirdly wrinkled in the lighting, but I assure you, it's a perfectly serviceable faux fur and faux leather coat. The most interesting parts about the coat, besides the Dr. Zhivago vibes it gives off, are definitely the two interior tags, which read, respectively:

"SIMULATION FUR IMPORTANT DO NOT DRY CLEAN DO NOT STEAM OR HEAT THIS GARMENT CLEAN ONLY BY THE FURRIERIZED METHOD 63% ACRYLIC 37% COTTON MADE IN ISRAEL"

And:

"Tissavel France GENUINE FRENCH SIMULATION FUR. Treat and clean like fur" 

Now tell me one normal thing about those garment markings-- not faux fur, but simulation fur. All caps, the word "furrierized", the odd distribution of acrylic to cotton proportions , the fact that it was made in Israel but distributed through a French manufacturer...I don't know what to tell you kids, the provenance of this coat is an enigma. Well, not it's latest provenance, as it came from the Rivergate Goodwill in a moment of weakness for $19.99 (I mentioned it in this better lit post here...maybe I should have worn it with that same belt! I feel regret).

I was reading this discussion thread on a vintage resellers message board about how instead of "faux" fur, you could describe these coats of the sixties' and seventies' as "fun" fur. Now, isn't that a Mad Men turn of phrase if ever you've heard it? I wore this coat to the flea market a couple months ago when it was mildly cold and heard no less than four jokes about my Teutonic appearance. Full disclosure, I had my hair in my usual braid-o'er-head and these same knee high leather boots on. "Is your name Heeeeidi?" one ancient woman in a folding in chair in the mule barn drawled at me. "Haha, no," I said, to which she replied, "You suuure look like a Heeeidi." Another guy in a baseball cap in the animal sheds asked "Sprecken sie deutsch?". Sadly, I do not sprecken. I've been watching a silent movie the last two days with English intertitles but German subtitles on Youtube, and it's funny how some sentences are completely understandable between knowing English and French, and some are as incomprehensible as Sanskrit to me. I think it's all the words mushed together into single words in some clauses...I was always impressed by my friends Ruthie and Tom who took upper level German right next door to my upper level French class in high school and could rattle off a pithy quote in the tongue of der Fatherland like it was nothing.

I wish I was wearing any of these outfits, esp the one on the right, today (source)

How do you deal with cold weather? Are you a snowbird, or do you hate, hate, hate being in sub-fifty-degree weather? What kinds of outfits inspire you when you have to dress like a Russian nesting doll to go out in the arctic? Let's talk!

Well, I'm going to spend the rest of the day pretending I have the day off due to snow-- I'm stuck in the phone room for most of my shifts today, which means plenty of time to finish watching my John Gilbert queue on Youtube  help patrons through the wonder of telephone reference. Have a great Monday! I'll see you tomorrow.