When I start the car, it idles a tad high around ~1200rpms...then if I let it sit it will slowly find its way back to ~850rpms..Is it just the cold weather?

ya, totally normal. the car needs to idle high because everything is ice cold (especially for new england and midwest folks) i guess the engine either wants to warm up a little faster than normal or it has a harder time keeping a good vacuum because everything's cold. i don't really know, but most cars i've driven are like that including my 97 esi. anyways, i'm done now.

Yes, it's perfectly normal. Just like ^^^ said, it's just during cold start-up.....

have you removed your egr system? if so that will cause it to possibly run higher idle at start due to the extended time it will take to warm the engine up. also it is normal for the most part due to the cold weather.

The EGR system is all stock, just cold weather - which is fine with me, as long as the engine is okay.

what about this...lately it has been around 28* here and every once in while, if the car hasn't been started for a couple days, when i start is up it takes a good amount of turns more to turn over, and when it does it will idle extremely rough, as if it was running on only 3 cyl. when it does this it doesn't idle very high at all, and after about 30-60sec it idles normal again. it doesn't happen too often, just if it's really cold and it's been sitting for awhile. what'ya think. sorry i'm not tryin' to hijack the thread, just wondering.