I habba bloddy dose.

I get these every winter, along with chapped hands. And there’s a sign of aging that I wish somebody had taken a moment to warn me about. “When you hit fifty, your hands are going to get chapped in the winter, sort of like how your lips get chapped except there’ll be a lot more blood and pain.” Okay, I guess I can see why nobody wanted to tell me that.

B’s hands get chapped across the backs and especially the knuckles. Tim is the same way. He can make his knuckles bleed by simply clenching his fist. My hands get chapped across the palms and insides of my fingers, especially the pads between the joints. I would’ve thought that the line across the finger at the joint would be the weak part, but no; the skin covering the meaty pads splits if I forget to slather a protective layer of Vaseline on them every day. (“Not gasoline! Vaseline! Why the hell would I want gasoline?”)

There wasn’t any way of not knowing about the bloody nose thing. I’ve always had that. Every so often I’d randomly get a bloody nose. Didn’t have to get punched in the face, or walk into a door. I did get a bloody nose if I walked into a door, but I’d get one just sitting in a chair, or walking down the street. Not sure why, but years ago I chalked it up to bad plumbing and thought no more about it. Then I came back to Wisconsin.

Winters are not just cold in Wisconsin, they’re insanely cold, and they’re so dry I can feel my skin mummifying. Turning into a mummy so I could stalk unsuspecting tomb raiders would be kind of cool, if I didn’t have to deal with the hand-chapping problem mentioned above. That would make me look forward to the mummy-stalking gig a whole lot less.