Friday, April 13, 2012

Getting Ready for Snow!

Our lives here in Eldora really do revolve around the weather even though we don't farm.  NOAA is still predicting snow for tomorrow and Sunday and the front is apparently close enough now that they're willing to go out on a limb and predict a 70% chance of snow tomorrow and a 90% chance of snow tomorrow night with an accumulation of three to five inches possible.  I'm prepared...























I've been whittling away on the woodpile and think it's getting smaller...






















...and the wood cord is getting bigger...


When I was a child, my sister and I used pieces of firewood to create sideboards on our red wagon so it would hold more wood.  I don't recall our parents teaching us this.  We were quite innovative.  I've adapted that idea by putting a shallow, flat piece of wood in the front of the wheelbarrow to keep the wood from falling out when I'm underway...


I've been amazed, despite the number of warm days we've had, how much ice remains under this woodpile...


Was it sawdust or straw that was used to insulate ice before refrigeration?

The only project I have planned for today is to try to repair the ding on this picture frame that I had painted ready to take to the resale shop in Rollinsville when Dixie knocked the space heater over and into it...


The frame has some very subtle carving on it and I didn't want to get Spackle in that.  I'll give this a light sanding and see how it looks, then if the winds remain calm, try to give the whole thing another coat of spray paint.

The winds were really strong all night and it was supposed to be 29F degrees and felt it.  They added to a night that made me feel as if I'd slept in a boiler factory housing barking dogs.  Dixie spent all afternoon in the backseat of my car with the door open.  I've positioned the overhead light switch so the light doesn't come on and run my battery down.  She got out about 6 p.m. and about half an hour later I saw her owner, who has returned from vacation, stop and pick her up, leaving the car door open, turn the car around and head back east, down the canyon, not west, toward her home.  She had her hair in an up-do and was wearing a black leather maxi coat, not her usual attire.  I walked out and closed the car door. 

At 1 a.m., having just entered sound sleep, I awoke thinking I'd dreamed I'd heard a dog barking.  But it was real.  It went on for at least 20 minutes. Finally I got up, got dressed, took the quilt down off the door and opened it to find both Jimmy and Dixie, bright-eyed and bushy-tailed, on my doorstep.  Their owner has told me she never lets them out after dark.  She also has told me they have full-time access to a greenhouse through a pet door, so she must usually lock the pet door at night.  I have no idea what they were doing afield unless she had attended some event, just got home, let them out thinking she'd put them right back in and they decided to come down for a midnight snack.  I fed them some canned pet food outside and told them to go home.  I think Jimmy did, but Dixie stayed out there, barking off and on for a full hour.  I don't think she was barking to be let in as she sounded as if she was out in the yard.  Finally I heard what sounded like something being pursued across the deck and the barking receded off into the east.  During this, the winds were really gusting and a bamboo wind chime I had purchased last year and just put back out during our warm spell, was repeatedly hitting the side of the cabin with a thunk.  I didn't think to take it down when I was feeding the dogs.  

I finally slept and was awakened sometime after sunrise to the sound of my cell phone repeatedly alerting me the battery was weak.  I put up with that for about an hour, hoping it would finally die, then got up, plugged it in, started the fire, put in a really big chunk of wood and turned on the second space heater.  I swear I heard Dixie bark at least once at this point, but I dared not open the door to check.  I guess she spent the entire night out in that horrible wind and low temperature in my yard.  I turned my electric blanket on high and went back to sleep until about 8:30 a.m., awake but not rested.

As a result, all I'm going to do the remainder of the day is go to the post office to mail some checks, return a library book and stop off at Ace, get some of those rubber spacers for my coat rack and take the new hand sander back and see if they can show me why I can't get that plastic dust canister cover to stay on.

Have to rest up for tomorrow and the grand opening of the new Goodwill in Longmont!  What have you got planned for the weekend?  Teddee





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