Mid morning. There was patchy freezing fog in the Flathead Valley. And patchy blue sky. And shades of pale pink in the in between.
On the first day of Winter
I put the snow thrower through its paces… only 2 1/2 inches of new snow, but I wanted to see if I could flatten out the ruts of frozen slush. I was partly successful – the driveway is better than it was and both the thrower and I survived the experience.
Then, a morning walk in brilliant sunshine…
On the first day of Winter.
Thursday
Thursday already!
We three members of the fambly Summers all “rise and shine” in our own unique ways…
Late yesterday afternoon, the temperature rose above freezing and stayed there overnight making everything a drippy, soggy mess. So, while not really cold enough to send a bear dog to his pillow, it is wet enough. And no, he doesn’t want to come in – he is free to come and go at his choosing.
Bob has the same freedom and chose a spot indoors.
It should be noted that both of them have been out on their morning rounds…
Me, I start with checking food and water bowls, loosing the boys to the outdoors and then coffee and a nibble: this morning, homemade rustic rye toast with peanut butter and my own cranberry-orange marmalade.
The snowthrower arrived home in working order (HEY, they had given me an incorrect belt – I feel a little bit vindicated in my repair efforts :)! ), a big storm is due with the forecast being 4-10 inches of snow, my pantry and frig are full, the work project deadline was met.
It is Thursday – hope all are having a good week!
The agony of defeat
That is the snowthrower in that trailer. It is going off to Big John’s.
The auger stopped augering on Thanksgiving Eve. I had a spare auger belt. The directions didn’t look bad and I have tools, can read, have done plenty of repairing/servicing of stuff. But, in recent years, Big John’s has been my go to place for home equipment as they pick up, service and deliver for a price so low it is hard to understand how they are making any money. But…it was Thanksgiving and snowing and forecast to snow more and I had all I needed so I began.
My first hurdle was getting the new belt on. I finally realized that at 15F, a rubber belt was going to have less give than normal and maybe warming it up would help. Also, it was getting dark. The belt spent the night in the house.
Friday, I got the belt on. I fired up the thrower. It started marching out of the garage on its own. I didn’t try the auger.
I have a work deadline to meet. I already had a couple of hours in the thrower. Discretion…valor, etc. – I made the call to Big John’s. Adding to the agony, I had to include a note about working on it. The good news is that it may be the source of amusement to whoever draws my thrower to work on. Laughter is good for the soul!
Meantime, the temperature rose above freezing. Three – four more inches of heavy wet snow has fallen. The snow and needles have come down off the trees in shuddering avalanches – sometimes on the roof of the house sounding a bit like the entire tree came with. It is a mess. It does this every year!…a VERY cold spell, a foot of snow and then a warm up.
Now, it is forecast to get cold again and more snow on top of slush that will freeze. Somehow it works out and looks beautiful again but at the moment not so much.
Although some long days this week on this project push, it has been a very good week. Hope yours has been as well – Happy Friday!