The snow lay on the ground

I'm pretty sure that if it weren't for Christmas, nobody would like December. Christmas has a way of romanticizing everything it touches. Shoveling snow is not a chore when I have Christmas music playing from my phone. Snow is gorgeous at Christmastime. I look forward to wearing warm sweaters at Christmas.

But come January, I'm like, "UGH. I have to shovel the driveway again? Will the snow EVER melt? This coat is so restricting."

And sadly, the snow we have had this week with the end of November and the beginning of December has been reminiscent of January. I hate January. But one of the things that's depressing about January is that Christmas is over, so it's ridiculous for me to feel sad about Christmas being over when it's Christmastime right now!

I had my first review posted on The Impulsive Buy. Then I spent Tuesday evening running around to seven different stores to find the next item I'm reviewing. I found it on Wednesday. That review should be up soon, I think.

Lots of people engaged in service on December 1, and as the day was coming up, I thought, "I'm usually pretty busy. Will I have time to do something?" Then I thought, "DUH. I'll be busy doing what I do every Thursday, which is service--helping tutor high school kids." Sometimes I don't feel very useful, but this week I felt needed, and it was good to get a refresher on polynomial division.

Sometimes I get inexplicably sad. On Friday, I was sitting at Kneaders, all by myself, stuffing my face with cake, the frosting smearing on my face, and I suddenly got depressed. Is this what twenty-eight years of living has amounted to?

On Saturday, after attending the Festival of Trees, I ran to the Bountiful Temple again, and ran 10.5 miles, a new record. Around the temple, the houses have pictures and scriptures of the Christmas story, and the copyeditor in me couldn't help critique the signs: "You're missing a space. You used hyphens in the ranges, not en dashes, though I don't care about that. It's 'brought forth,' not 'brought fourth.'" They're not major problems, but it looks like they spent a lot of time and money on the signs, so they should have been more careful.

My hands were pretty cold. I wore gloves with grips so I could carry a water bottle, but they weren't warm. I have found gloves to be the single most important piece of cold-weather running apparel. When I see someone running with pants, jacket, and hat but with bare hands, I think, "You're doing it wrong!" My knees are also sore--trails are easier on the joints, but they're all covered in snow. I need to stay in shape for that moment the glacier lilies pop their upside-down heads out, signalling the return of trail season.

Then I came home and made fennel soup. I had never had fennel before. It kind of blew my mind.

I used the bulbs in the soup, but I tried a few of the stalks. They have the texture of celery, but they taste like licorice! The soup was good, but it didn't taste like licorice. (The soup had onions in it, and as I'm currently fasting, I'm craving cooked onions. I hated onions until I came to appreciate cooked ones. How can people like raw ones?!)

A week after Thanksgiving, we finally got our tree up. I like putting the lights on. My dad hates it and he does a horrible job, so everyone wins when I do it.

Sorry this was a little scattered. I guess I don't really have a terribly interesting life. 

***

I had kind of decided I would only do another pumpkinundation roundup if I had more pumpkin items, which barely happened this week. Peppermint, gingerbread, and eggnog are the dominant flavors now.

 I love these Ice Breakers Candy Cane Mints. They have a great refreshing, minty flavor, and they're festive. 5/5.

 I actually got these Candy Cane Tic Tacs last year but didn't finish them before Christmas ended, so I still had them. (They come in bigger containers now.) I appreciate the effort, but there's an unusual minty flavor in them that is not reminiscent of candy canes. It's more like Fresh Mint Tic Tacs. The Icebreakers actually freshen breath, but these don't. 3/5.

 Again, I got these Candy Cane Pop Rocks last year but didn't finish them. Peppermint/candy cane is one of those flavors that is easy to do, but these taste nothing like it. They have the colors, but not the flavor. But I guess Pop Rocks are about the texture, not the flavor. 3/5.

 Here's the thing about sugar cookies. For most holidays, it is only the shape and color that makes them seasonal, and I prefer unique flavors. For Christmas, though, they are iconic to the holiday, as long as they are appropriately festive. Therefore, I tend to avoid Kneaders sugar cookies at most holidays--except for the Fourth of July and Pioneer Day, when they're the only seasonal desserts they have, and Christmas, when they are iconic. Kneaders does many things very well, but their sugar cookies are sub-par. These Santa ones have more toppings than usual, with sprinkle beard, chocolate chip eyes, and cinnamon candy nose. Most of them have a marshmallow for the little puff at the end of the hat, but I got cheated out of a marshmallow. 4/5.

 I only had enough calories for a mini Dairy Queen Candy Cane Oreo Blizzard. It was like two Blizzards in one--the bites with candy cane tasted like candy cane, and the bites with Oreo tasted like Oreo. I didn't think I could really taste both at the same time. Still good though. 5/5.

 I got to have three flavors of ice cream and custard at Farr's Fresh Cafe: Farr's sugar cookie, peppermint, and eggnog ice cream. I thought the sugar cookie and eggnog tasted pretty similar. The peppermint was a little minty, but not terribly so. 5/5.

 I first had Sugar Cookie Pop-Tarts in 2013, and I've had them every year since then. They have fun pictures on the front, and the filling is like sugar cookie dough. These are my very favorite Pop-Tart. 5/5.

 I forgot to take a picture when my Arctic Circle candy cane shake was mostly full. It's covered with red and green mint candies. I think they keep their pieces too big, so they stick to my teeth and I spend half my time crunching the mints. Still refreshing and tasty. 4.5/5.

 These Gingerbread Larabars are definitely better than the pumpkin pie ones, but I didn't find them that different from Larabars in general. 3.5/5.

 I know some people use chocolate milk as a post-workout recovery drink, but I consider it off limits. I do miss it sometimes, so I was delighted they had this TruMoo Chocolate Peppermint Milk. It's mostly chocolate milk, but it has a hint of a minty flavor. 5/5.

 I was eating this Kneaders peppermint chocolate cake when I suddenly became depressed. Would people judge me for sitting by myself, eating giant bites of this unhealthy thing, with the minty whipped topping getting on my face? I would have preferred it the way they used to have it, as a slice of cake rather than an individual cake, but this change wasn't as different as it was for the pumpkin cake.  It's just chocolate cake with a light minty topping and filling. 4/5.

 I like these Trident Layers Candy Cane gum. Very minty. 4/5.

 Twinkie-wise, I didn't miss Hostess when they went out of business in 2012. But since they've been back, they've done lots of holiday themes, so I'm glad they went under if this is the way they came back! The last Twinkies I had were their patriotic ones, which were boring. These White Peppermint Twinkies have a coating on them. They have a light minty flavor, which I liked. They also had little sugar crystals, which made it a little crunchy. I didn't like that. 4/5.

 My favorite place to eat Clif Bars is up on a mountain, but at this time of year I have to settle for grabbing one before a long street run. These Hot Chocolate Clif Bars taste like a standard chocolate flavor; I don't know what makes it "hot." I like the year-round chocolate brownie ones better. 3.5/5.

Then here's the one pumpkin item for the week: Torani Pumpkin Pie Flavored Syrup. I put it in hot chocolate, but I didn't know how much to add, so I didn't taste it at first. I kept adding more as I drank more. The bottom of the mug had a bit of a baked good flavor to it, but I wouldn't call it pumpkin pie. But to be fair, I'd have to try this again with more of the syrup in it. 3/5.

And then, since I ran ten miles yesterday, I could freely eat a FatBoy Eggnog Ice Cream Sandwich. They have kind of a graham sandwich, and the ice cream really tastes like eggnog. It's hard to do eggnog ice cream wrong. 5/5.