Spring is Springing!

Not only did we just have a whole night of some severe thunderstorms the other night, today the trees and scrub underbrush all have that green aura before it starts to bud out. And we don't tap our sugar maples, but you can tell the sap is flowing considering the big red buds they're sprouting right now. We likely have one more good snow storm coming off of Lake Michigan before it's really spring, but Persephone is definitely back topside. I saw my allergist the other week, and I'm stocked up on my nasal spray, I'm ready for the flowers!

You want to kill a whole season? Have major surgery at the very beginning, and spend half of it on Oxy. I'm sitting here like "damn, summer event calendars are about to drop, I need to start getting with people and making plans..." while we're just coming out of the "is it late November or early March?" weather vibe, and I'm still not sure if I'm recipe prepping for Thanksgiving or grill season because that was a blip on the surgery timeline last year.

The spring-ness is being emphasized by my main entertainment today being watching a jar of lentils sprout. "Riveting," I'm sure you're thinking, but this is just 78 cents of Aldi green lentils that started sprouting pretty much the minute they were hydrated and saw sunlight. This is fun to watch! And I'm going to have Buddha bowls for dinner once they have lil bb leaves!

The birds are starting to come back up north, too, and it's blowing the cats' minds. This is Penelope and Milosh at the end of my bed as I write this post:

The bird can and can't be seen in-between the branches of the shrub in the top right window frame.

Bird is much clearer here. Milosh is obsessed.

In more warm weather news, the bikini I ordered arrived today! Now, any physical stress triggers a migraine for me, and that includes ANY sunburn. 3% of my body? Migraine until the burn heals. So, I wear full-length UPF50 compression leggings, a full-sleeved UPF50 hoodie, and water shoes to swim. I am absolutely appropriate for a public beach in a Muslim country. But, you need to wear "underwear" underneath for support, and ease of switching out of wet bathing clothes to dry, not appropriate for the Dubai mall but totally appropriate for any Michigan coastal area "town clothes." Besides, the extreme UV protection is unneeded in an indoor hot tub, or at midnight.

I am so ready for this.