My kind of weather: just keep it dry

I’m writing this article for the IndieWeb carnival. Thanks to Jeremy for the prompt and for reminding me in a jolt that I signed up to host next month’s edition, a decision that I may regret when the time comes to actually write about my prompt.

Listen… as long as humidity is low, I’m a happy lil’ dude. That’s really all there is to it. And maybe that’s why moving to Grenoble is making me so happy – it’s so much drier here than in Paris! I have not looked at a single stat before making this bold statement and may be completely wrong, but just trust me, alright? It’s so dry! It’s great!

Yay, (dry) summer!

Warm weather? Sure, as long as it’s dry heat and not suffocating. I’m happy with a solid high-30 degrees weather and scorching sun. Every summer, unfailingly, I buy a bottle of sunscreen and it sits next to my bathroom sink, to be used once or twice just after I got a bad sunburn. Then the summer ends, and I actually have a nice tan, and then it’s winter and I retreat into my den and my whole body turns as white as my butt, and then it’s warm and sunny and I go bask in the sunlight and get a horrible sunburn and buy another bottle of sunscreen. And then I put it next to my bathroom sink, and so on. I blame my parents for never telling me about this whole sunscreen thing until women’s magazines started yelling at me.

Yay, (dry) winter!

I love skiing, so I don’t mind snow and I love the cold. This may also come from growing up in Québec, or from wanting to « be one of the boys » (read: catch my death by refusing to wear a jacket) long before I had any thoughts about the Big G, or, you know, spending most of my adolescence in an ice rink training for a sports career that stopped before it even took off.

An aside on ice rinks: I highly recommend Tillie Walden’s graphic memoir Spinning. She tells us about being a young lesbian (coming out to herself, then to others) in Texas who wakes up at 4am every day to go to figure skating practice, and who realises, slowly, that she doesn’t even really like it. It’s just part of her life. Not all of the memoir resonated with my personal story and feelings about (speed) skating, but all of it was amazing. TW for an act of sexual assault at one point and for LGBTQphobia pretty much always.

Anyway, my point was: I love the winter! I love when it’s cold and dry and I can go skiing! My parents once accidentally locked me out of the car wearing only my snow pants and a t-shirt for 10 minutes by -26°C and not only did I have a great time but I also have a fun anecdote (???) to tell literally everyone even though nobody asked! (I do realise that this whole blog post isn’t shedding the kindest light on my parents. Mom, dad, I’m sorry and also please stop stalking me. Grownups are so cringe and the fact that I’m turning 30 in less than 6 months does not change that.)

Speaking of winter, I didn’t want to do the whole climate change anxiety in this blog post, but I do need to express that skiing really occupies my mind these days. Having tried to plan snowy holidays these past years, and coming back to my hometown now and seeing that the mountain tops aren’t white year-round anymore, fills me with existential dread, and I feel like I should really make the most of my skis right now because there aren’t many winters left where we’ll have enough snow for gliding. It breaks my heart.

Is every single kind of weather my kind of weather?

The spring and autumn are humid, I’ll give you that, but… the spring is so cool. First of all, it has my birthday. Also, days are getting longer. And it has flowers! And you can go outside at the first ray of sunshine and catch a cold and/or a sunburn that puts you back inside for a few days with a good book and warm tea!

And autumn has the prettiest trees and also gives you a great excuse to start hibernating with a good book and a huge pot of tea. Aesthetics for the win!

If it’s reaaaally humid, you’ll probably find me somewhere inside my apartment with a book and a bottle of water. I’ll be easy to track down: just follow the grumbling sounds until you’re at my door. I can’t guarantee I’ll find the will to get up and open the door, though.