And I am sunburnt

I get a lot of 'cold days'. Days when I simply cannot warm up without hiding completely under a duvet (with my heatie-wheatie snuggly cat, obviously). It's a horrible cold, I feel like I'm cold right to the middle of me; the closest thing to it I have experienced pre-ME was when I had a narrow brush with hypothermia on a Silver DofE practice expedition. It takes no account of the real temperature around me - nor, in a fantastically annoying collaboration, does it mind being interrupted for a few minutes by the hot flushes of peri-menopause. Cold, cold, cold,hot, hot, hot, cold, cold, cold ARRRRGH. Make up your mind already!

Almost every day, I find myself with cold hands and feet, which I assume must be something to do with circulation. I recently started wearing fingerless gloves (note to self: blog later about wonderful fuzzy fingerless gloves with bows and trimmings) which has helped a surprising amount - having fewer issues typing and generally not dropping things. Trying hard to make this look like a fashion statement rather then emergency measures :)

So, yesterday being Midsummer Eve and Fathers' Day, my body took one look at the clear, shining blue sky and decided 'cold day'. Bastard. Cue me arriving at my in-laws muffled up in socks and soft boots, my bestest black elbow-length fingerless gloves, with a cardigan and a woolly wrap over my nice skirt and sweater. Bless them both, they are used to me and didn't even blink - not even when I went straight to sit in the sunniest spot in their garden, from which I didn't move until home time.

And that's how I came to be sunburnt. I'm not a sit in the sun person at all. Shade for me, every time. But I so wanted to be warm. The sun felt wonderful. After about an hour, the woolly wrap was history. After lunch, the cardigan went too. Bliss. I felt far too good, as well as too tired,  to move - and the sun snuck in between the short sleeves of my sweater and gloves and did what it does to the stripe of bare skin there.

Peversely, I discovered myself feeling ridiculously cheered up by the realisation I had burned stripes on my arm and across my nose. I can only assume that I associate the sunburnt state - the glow, the tug of tightening skin, the 'ow ow ow, mmmm that's better' of aftersun lotion - with my formerly active days. I've never been a sunbather, so sunburn is something my mind links with a day's hiking, or gardening. Anyway, it may (ok, it does) look ridiculous, but it cheered me up for the whole evening.

In fact, it's making me smile right now.