I am sitting at my dining room table, laptop open, fingers too cold to type.

The front door is propped open so three movers can bring in some gym equipment pieces from a “Universal” that I am eyeing up for drying our biggest bath towels and sheets. I also saw some smaller pegs that would be great for hanging socks and “delicates” and by delicates I mean socks that already have holes in them so I have to be careful not to make them bigger.

Each time the movers walk past me, they stop to talk about how cold it is outside.

Indeed. It is.

Do you know what’s making the -23 degrees outside feel even colder? My front entrance mat collecting frosty patches of ice while we talk about it.

I’m having a hard time understanding why they can’t close the door in between moves. I can appreciate that they’re not going to set down a piece of equipment and close the door behind them when they first walk in but maybe when they leave the house to have a smoke out by the truck? That just seems like common courtesy. Smoke break=close front door. I thought they learned that the first day of moving school after how to fold the floor blankets the way Martha would and how to pretend you’re not scoping the house for your return visit to rob the place. If you plan to take three smoke breaks for a thirty minute job, close the front door if the temperature dips below minus twenty. That has to be in the handbook.

One guy has a big, fuzzy beard covered in ice. I’m watching the mats they threw down on my floor catch the drips every time he comes in from the cold and into the bitter cool. At least I’ve got his DNA all over the place.

“Man that’s a cold one out there. Feels colder than yesterday.”

Of course it does. Yesterday, my heat was on and my door was closed.

“Yesterday it was bitter.”

It sure was Fuzzy. We should talk about it some more. First, let’s take the door right off the hinges so it doesn’t distract us.

The second guy looks exactly like Boober Fraggle who couldn’t see through his thick red bangs, except he’s a real boy and not a muppet. He likes to talk about his trailer and how they sure knew how to party there. I suspect Fraggles are known partiers and not well liked in the trailer parks.

I bet it wasn’t this cold in his trailer. The bangs which are the equivalent of half a sweater are probably keeping him warm too.

I watch two women walk past on their daily route only today they’re wearing ski goggles. Yep, ski goggles for a walk. It’s that cold.

I go to my closet to find some ski goggles so I can sit at my computer without throwing up icicles. I’m assuming it would take care of the glare issue and maybe the biting wind swirling around my dining room.

I choose not to put them on only because I don’t want to have a funny wind-burn line and also, we don’t own any ski equipment.

Exercise equipment? We now own lots of that. I can’t even imagine using it in this weather.

I’m not trying to look like a jerk, wearing my winter coat, hat, scarf at my dining room table but Fuzzy and Boober Fraggle get to wear ice jumpers with full beards and bangs down to their moustaches. I’m simply not dressed for this.