Snowjob

I've often sacrified warmth for the sake of fashion, but I found out the hard way that fingerless gloves are not worth the frostbite. My big booted snowprints were followed by a pack of pawprints belonging to naieve kanines who thought I looked kind enough to give shelter to stray dogs. They found out the hard way I am not as kind as I look. You'd think the iditarod stretched between the taxi and my front door.

Its hard to believe that just last week I was sifting sand out of my bikini and worrying that my peeling nose was a sign of skin cancer. But that was Thailand, and this is Istanbul. Just when I decided that sun worship was the closest I'd come to divine revelation, a huge snowstrom came into my forecast.

Around Valentine's Day snow is always in the air. Not for the lovers, but for the loveless. Maybe the broken hearted need something spontaneous and pure to restore their faith in love. Something like snow They can absorb the swirling white beauty and replace fragile hearts with unbreakable snowglobes, the fresh flakes beating new life into stale memories, making them crisp and beautiful again. It is still February and I am already in a Spring state of mind, what with my my newly renewed vow to get in shape and a brand new juicer - my new toy, my personal Jamba Juice, my symbol of endless summer - sparkling in my kitchen.

I was told that Istanbul has four seasons, just not to the extremes as, say, the ones in Chicago. Not as extreme in temperature perhaps, but more extreme in degree. It has more to do with circumstances than temperature. If its hot, its sweltering, if there's traffic, its at a standstill, if you're going out at night, you're coming in with the sunrise. If it snows, the pace is slower, the cold is more bitter, and the world is harder. On me, specifically. Hence, the day of a blizzard, I ran out of gas.

Its not that I haven't noticed the odd looking tank under my sink for the past six months. I just didn't realize how gas got from that tank into my stove. Perhaps I subconsciously thought the little gas faries kept refilling it. Or I simply haven't used an entire canister of gas yet, the times I turn on the stove being few and far between.

This being Istanbul, a city of extreme degree, I ran out of gas the day of a blizzard, the same day I had sudden, insatiable craving for Mexican food. No Mexican is not Tapas from the mall you people who have never been south of the boarder. It was the day I trudged to the store in the snow to purchase tobasco sauce (picante), cliantro(fresh) cajun seasonings,(ow ow!) lavaş wraps (as close to tortillas as I could get), all at imported international prices. The day I chopped and sauteed and soaked until the moment when the beans were nearly cooked, the rice was nearly soft, and my gas totally, absolutely, completely, fully empty. The phase now your cooking with gas came to mind, except I wasn't.

But back to my new love: the juicer. (My friend got engaged and I got a juicer - whose the lucky one?) After ten days of fresh tropical juice in Thailand, I decided I couldn't live without it. My juicer eats everything - even broccoli - and makes it palatable when mixed with oranges and carrots. Juicing and watching the snow makes me disproportionaltely happy, in the same way that eating alone makes me disproportionately sad. But I guess it has to with living in a city of extreme degrees. At least I can drink my meals from now on.