My Natural Happy Light

High today: -8 F
Low today: -24 F and dropping...
Sunrise today: 9:43am
Sunset today: 3:31pm

First off, HAPPY BIRTHDAY MOM!! I have no recent pictures of you, otherwise I'd post one! How old are you.. 46?? haha.. we'll just let the blog readers believe that. ;) It's realistic if you were my age when you had me!
It seems like there have been a few concerns lately, "how cold is it?", "how dark is it?", "how's that cabin treating you?", "how's school?"

Here are my answers: "it was in and around the zeros but now it's dropped to 25 below for a bit", "down to 5 hours and some minutes", "cabin is great!", "school is nuts, as usual this time of the semester!"

I was worried about November coming because I was told that if you have SAD (Seasonal Affective Disorder) you will start to notice a change in your mood when the first week of November rolls around. It's the third week of November and other than me not wanting to get out of bed before the sky gets somewhat light and being a little stressed over school stuff, I am still feeling good. But me not wanting to get out of bed is nothing new. :) It is a well known fact that I hate mornings no matter if it's 4:30am or 10am, unless I'm promised something cool like a road trip that day or if the aurora is blazing outside or if a small child decides to jump on my bed. ;) No more waking up in the light until I get down to the east coast in a little over a month! Even there though, the sun will set at 4pm in December.

The days are dropping on the times I can say "last year at this time" and still refer to life in PA. It's a little bit strange but makes me a little bit proud to say I've almost made an entire year here successfully. It seems like yesterday that I was getting some funny looks from people in PA when I said I was moving to Alaska and it seems like yesterday that I got the email saying I got into grad school - and I can still relive that feeling. The first few months starting out anywhere new can really suck but now Fairbanks is like home. I can go many places in town and try to avoid seeing people I know as much as possible, but this town is a little bit like State College in that it is big enough to hide but small enough to see someone everywhere you go. It is that size of a town that I like for sure...

Alright, enough rambling. Should I ride my bike tomorrow morning to beat my cold riding temperature? It's very tempting but I think skiing will be the way to go tomorrow. We'll see what time permits in the morning!