Winter is definitely here...

I am going to take a small break from the trip and tell you about my day today and the events of the last few weeks since I have been back from my trip. Today hasn't even really started yet but I got up and worked out and I had plans to meet my site mate at the stadium to run this morning. The winter has been pretty mild and there hasn't been much snow so there really is no reason not to run outside. As soon as we were headed out it started snowing but it is light so no big deal. Now the drainage system in Ukraine is...well...non existent in some respects. So it has been raining lately and so warm that whatever snow we do get melts right away. Now this is fine in my book but that means a lot of puddles. So today because it is actually a little colder the puddles have frozen over so walking outside is challenging. Now when I say puddles I mean small lakes. There are places where the water is knee deep.

So I walk to the stadium to meet my site mate. I am pumped that I am going to run after months. The sidewalks are horrible and really slippery so I almost fall and break my ass quite a few times. Now I am not sure where he is but I am walking slow to the stadium. I don't see him anywhere. I walk up to the stadium and I think that is him stretching and getting ready to run. I go to the front door but it is locked. Now they are doing construction at the stadium so I could just walk in where the fence used to be but there is just a lot of construction materials in the way but it doesn't matter. So I walk around to the side where there is an opening and there is an area over there where water really likes to hang out.

Now everything looks frozen over so I walk on what I think is ice over to the grass so that I can get around into the stadium and my feet go right in. All the way up to my calves. Not only am I soaked through to my bones but its all muddy and my entire foot and calf area are black. My pants are black and wet, my shoes are now a different color and I am sure my socks are black. SHIT! I find my site mate and tell him the story and I obviously can't run now. Not to mention the track is like a skating rink! Everything is icy and its snowing. What was I thinking?

Now to catch you up on some of the events of the past two weeks. Urkainian Christmas strikes again on January 6th and 7th. I went over to Anya's with Jeremie and had dinner with her and her husband and her three kids. This was not your average Christmas dinner. We only had a small few courses. On this day Ukrainians cool 12 dishes and spread this out all around the table. All of their family comes to have dinner and it is a big event. I did it last year with my counterpart and her family.

Last night was Old New Year. Another holiday that is in January. This is when people dress up and go around and sing to people in stores and at their homes. It is like Christmas Caroling only up a few levels. Sometimes kids just ring your doorbell or bang on your door all night and into the morning like that shit is funny? Damn kids!

There is always excitement going on in the center around the big Christmas tree and to finish the night you can hear fireworks going off in the distance.