Thank F* it's February

Finally! January is done with for another year, and boy do I HATE January.

Why do I hate January (the queen of vomit has just asked), let's see how many reasons I can come up with:

1. it comes straight afer the enforced jollity and gaiety of Christmas and New Year.
2. after 2-3 weeks of Christmas lights in the house January seems DARK and DISMAL, the days don't get light until 8am it seems and the evenings start at 5pm, on a cloudy day it's quite possible to need lights on in the house at midday, I feel as though I'm living in middle earth with the hobbits.
3. it's a LONGGGGGGGGGGGGGG month, funny how the 31 days of August and July seem to fly by whilst all 31 days of January drag their dirty heels.
4. the weather is shite, and this year's has surpassed itself in its awfulness, have we had 2 consecutive days without snow on the ground? It really doesn't feel like it. We currently have frozen compacted snow on the road from 6 days ago that has had 2 dumpings on top of it since - and we're not talking minor dumpings here, oh no. It's now deep enough that the Germans' favourite dog (the dachshund) can no longer walk about without risking frozen balls at the very least.
5. there are no bank holidays in January (I don't count January 1st - it's part of the whole Christmas/New Year thing)
6. it's flipping ages till any holiday - Easter? End of March, that's 12 whole weeks away - we don't get half term here in Germany, 12 weeks of getting up in the dark, that's just barbaric.
7. the shops are full of grebby sale stock, there's nothing pretty and exciting to see in the stores, that's if there's any money left over from the excesses of December!
8. remember that song - 'january, sick and tired, you've been hanging on me' it's by Pilot, a Scottish band from the 70's, maybe that's the cause of my January hatred? Afterall, in 1975 it was in the charts for 10 weeks and in '75 I'd have been 10, probably a very formative age, maybe ever since then I've harboured a deep and (at times not so) secret loathing for the first month of the year...

And so to February? What is there that's so fantabulous about the month of Feb?

1. it's not January!
2. we're 31 days closer to SPRING.
3. there's only 28 days (or 29 if we're unlucky) of February.
   
4. shrove tuesday, they don't 'do' shrove Tuesday here in Germany, despite pfannkuchen (pancakes) being very popular. But it's great fun trying to explain the concept of Shrove Tuesday to a tame German (not quite as much fun as the explanation behind bonfire night - we put a guy, no, not a real guy, on a bonfire to commemorate the time in the 1600's when parliament was nearly blown up and then the people who were caught trying to do this were hung, drawn and quartered - which then leads onto the explanation of hung, drawn and quartered) also great fun getting your tame German to try to say the word 'shrove' I don't think they have the 'sh' sound in their vocab (they also struggle with 'th')
   
5. valentines day - I personally demand chocolate, at the very least. And dinner cooked by my beloved - after 20 years of marriage he's got steak and mushrooms down to a fine art! A thoughtfully chosen gift would be nice but over optimistic, chocolate will have to suffice thanks darling!
6. Karneval. Rosenmontag is (monday (snigger) sorry, private joke...) February 15th this year, it's like Shrove Tuesday (except that'd be a Tuesday) in that it moves around dependant upon Easter or something... So in this area the schools are off for the day so that the kids can dress up and go and stand outside in the freezing cold in Düsseldorf or Köln for 4-5 hours and watch the carnival procession go by and try to catch as many sweets that are thrown from the processional floats as possible - goodness knows why, most of it goes in the bin later anyway.

I'm trying hard to think of more reasons to lurve February but I seem to have hit a mental block.

Welcome February, good to see you at last, but don't be hanging around for too long!! I love March too, despite its 31 days....


*I wanted the title to be 'thank f**k it's february' but I made the fatal (and therefore not to be repeated error) of discussing this subject with Si, who tutted at me...