I have a confession to make. I'm a big fan of winter. I love the snow. Bitter cold, not so much, but I love looking outside and seeing everything covered in big blankets of snow.

Walking to work this morning through unshovelled sidewalks, I admit, was not fun. But everytime I saw a big, puffy snowdrift, I had to refrain from jumping in and making snow angels.

Most of last week, I spent without a kitchen sink. Most of you already know how energy inefficient my house is. I bought the house inexpensively because it's what I could afford. But as older houses go, there are usually problems. Problems that I was aware of, but went into because I knew that with a little time and mostly money, that it could be fixed.

One of the biggest problems (one of, not the biggest…) is that one of the previous owners had built an extension of the house, sort of like a sunroom, except without the windows. This room's insulation is pretty bad, most of the coldness emanates from here. This is where the kitchen is located.

Now, I guess in the course of me cleaning up the backyard, I had jarred open the trapdoor to the crawlspace underneath the kitchen. This let a lot more air in… cold, freezing air. Nothing was insulated down there. In fact, as I learned this week, much of the subfloor had broken off and the kitchen is essentially resting on plywood.

The weekend before this happened, the boyfriend was over as usual, and I would make dinner as usual, and opt out of doing the dishes until the next day (Monday), as always. Monday night, I came home, and realized that water was not coming out of my kitchen sink. My first instinct was that the city shut off my water for whatever reason… construction? busted pipes? I don't know. But every other tap worked in the house, including the sink in my basement.

I poured some hot water down the sink, suspecting ice buildup. The water stood still (and mixed in with crap from the dirty dishes turned a lovely bronze colour. So with a resigned sigh, I went to clean my plates and cutlery in the upstairs washroom.

I told my mother about the sink and how I had to go see a plumber. Being who they are, my parents insisted on coming over and taking care of the problem myself, even though I knew my dad was busy and tried to get them to stay and take care of their own renovations. My dad checked things out, and told me about the open trap door, the lack of insulation, the frozen pipes and the broken subfloor. The next day, he installed a heat tracer through the pipes. The sink was totally functional as of Friday. This week, he said he would come by to install the insulation down there.

The thing is, I love my house. I fell in love with it when I first saw it because it had the charm associated with an old home. But it needs serious TLC, and I've been relying too much on my family to get things done around here. However, the alternative option is spending thousands of dollars on the necessary repairs. So I'm torn doing that, or going the slow, but less expensive method.

Living without a kitchen sink isn't the worse thing that could happen to someone. At least I still had running hot water in my house, though it was an inconvenience to go upstairs to wash a dish. We take our little modern conveniences for granted, I think. It'd be interesting to see what would happen if our current society (I mean, everyone), had to revert to pioneer days when you had to actually walk out to a well to get your water, and when indoor plumbing was considered high tech and wonderful.

Link pimp! Treehugger.com's How to Go Green

I've been trying to reduce my footprint. It's been interesting so far.

My house is completely energy inefficient. The insulation is pretty much terrible and it's an old house, so I'm not sure this could be fixed easily. I wish I had the money for that kind of renovation but for now, I can only do small things. Mind you, the temperature outside has been consistently -15°C or lower for the past week and will be for a while. I've been trying to conserve energy and hopefully keep the bills a touch lower.

I keep the temperature on my thermostat low and bear the cold by bundling up comfortably. (I completely dress down in my sexy fleece drawstring pants and oversized hoodie when I come home at thet end of the day. My accessory of choice are these plush fleece booties. Sexy!) When I'm at work during the day, or out for a long period of time, I try to remember to turn it down a few degrees lower (just enough so my cats aren't freezing though) I have a portable heater that I can move from room to room if I need it. It's a little better than raising the thermostat to heat the whole house. It's a little cold, but at least I'm comfortable. I don't bother with the heater when I'm asleep. Under my duvet (probably my favourite thing in the world), everything is heaven.

I also discovered that they made flourescent chandelier bulbs. So after a trip to Home Depot (that I had to go to anyway to pick up some new sink stoppers for my kitchen sink) I picked a few of them up for a floor lamp that I use regularly in my living room.

I shut off all the lights, my computer and the TV before I go to bed. The only light I keep on is lamp using a flourescent bulb in my basement for my kitties. I know they see well in the dark, but I hope that light down there has been encouraging them not to “miss” the litterbox so much.

Hopefully, I'll see some positive results in my utility bills this month. Ever since the more recent reports that humans may have done irreparable damage to our planet, I've been growing a little cynical about everything. So while I'm in the “why bother anymore” phase, at the least, anything I do can save me some money and hope the Green trend lasts.

Remember what they always used to tell you in school, and what your parents would drill into your head before you went to go play outside: Look Both Ways before you cross the street.

Makes sense, right?

It's still not registering with some people, and the solution obviously isn't re-education, but instead to simply ban the “offending” products. Like it's Apple's fault that people are stupid.

Unfortunately there's really no way to fine people for having no common sense.

It's bright, sunny days like this when the mercury dips down to -16°C, and the snow is hard on the sidewalk, when the freezing wind is in my face, freezing my skin, that I'm glad that I never ebayed my parka.

Even so, as I trudged my way against the wind to work, I watched some guy in a beige spring jacket (no hat, no scarf, no gloves) run to the parking lot from a block away, covering his ears with his bare hands. I guess some people would do anything to look as though the weather doesn't affect them.

It's frostbite territory. Bundle the fuck up.