The city streets are wet again with rain

I needed to pick up a couple stamps this morning, so I decided to walk the couple blocks down to the post office. Turns out my memory is quite faulty and the trip there and back turned out to be a mile and a half.

Whoops.

Well, it was nice to get some fresh air, anyway.

. . .

Even though the weather is still cold and soul-destroying (as recommended by my thesaurus in the stead of the old standby "dreary"), there are clear signs that spring is sprung or is right around the corner.

The foremost and mostly foreboding sign is that my allergies are coming to life. My eyes are itchy when I wake up and I have had sneezing jags of up to eight in a row in the last few days. My nose is dry and congested and runny, sometimes in turn, sometimes in combination.

It's funny, but I never had allergies before I moved to Seattle. Or, more accurately, I always had allergies, but nothing around for them to react to. It also seems like every year they get more and more severe. It was just a bit the first year, barely noticeable, and attributable to just breathing heated air more than I was used to. The next year it was worse, and the next was even more so. At one point, I was convinced there was a problem with the apartment we were in, but moving didn't bring about the expected abatement.

I fully expect that if I remain in Seattle for another five years, one fine spring day I will just abruptly stop breathing.

Time to go to the drugstore and stock up.