SNOW!!!!!!

 Oops – I thought I posted last week – but when I looked at my copy of saved posts – last week's post was blank.

I did start taking the ornaments off the trees – but got sidetracked by snow – plus somehow I am missing 2 ornaments and broke one.

We have had SNOW!  We had about 18 inches, while to the east of us it was close to 24 inches.  This is suppose to be the 3rd highest amount of snow in the area – so those of you who read this and think “2 feet – big deal” will understand.

The storm started late Friday night – before it started coming down the county plow/sander trucks put down salt mixture on our street to keep the snow from sticking as much.  

Per the newscast husband likes, when we went to bed the night before (Thursday night) we were to get 6-12 inches.  Since we are towards the west side of our county and the county west of us was to have up to 6 inches and the county to the east of us was to have 12 and up inches – we sort of figured we would get be getting towards the low end of the 6-12 inches.  Husband falls asleep much quicker than I do and when I checked the weather again a couple of hours later we had been upgraded to 8-12 inches.  He was in a panic straight through the week in anticipating of any snow – let alone this much. When we woke on Friday morning  - anticipated snow amounts from the storm had been raised and our area could get as much as 20 inches!!  He was very upset and nervous.  

When we came home on Thursday we had parked our car as close to the sidewalk as we could so in an emergency we could just clear out behind it and back out of the driveway – this is not easy to do, remember we live on 4 lane main road -  but we do so with our RV – I stand in the street with a walkie talkie and tell him when to pull out.  

It snowed – and it snowed – and it snowed.  We guess that by the end of the storm late Saturday we had 16-18 inches of snow. The general advice on the weather reports was to wait until Sunday to clear the snow as it was fluffy, light snow and would remain same.  After the snow stopped on Saturday we heard a snowblower close by – looked out and a man was clearing our sidewalk.  He went on to clear our two driveway cuts and run the blower one trip through our semi-circular drive – he also cleared the sidewalk in front of the house north of us – and then he went across the street to the one house there which faces our street.  Our best guess is that he is the neighbor who lives 2 hours south of us – we met him once, during another bad snowstorm when he was helping the neighbor in the house between us as her husband has medical problems.  I am am going to mail a note to him thanking him (hope it was him).  

Sunday we went out and cleared the snow remaining in front of our house.  It only took us about 2 hours and husband felt much more comfortable and better as we could easily get out of our driveway in an emergency.  

Since the salting process Thursday night we had not seen anyone from the county come through – no plow – the road on Sunday had one lane centered on the two lanes that actually exist in each direction which had been worn through the snow by vehicles traveling on the road.  

Sometime between when we went to bed on Saturday night around 4 am and when we woke up Sunday (early afternoon) the plow finally had come through.  Both cuts of our driveway now had about 3 ft of heavy, packed snow in them!  

We ate a quick lunch, dressed in heavy winter clothing and went out to again clear the cuts.  We were working at it – using a light duty snow blower,  snow shovels and a metal spade shaped garden shovel (to slice/hit the packed snow and break it loose).  Husband was just this side of crying.  Then a miracle.  In the 30+ years we have lived no one has stopped to help us before the neighbor went through with his snow blower  - a fellow in a pickup trip with a snow plow on the front saw our situation and came to help – he drove his snow plow into the packed snow on one of our driveway cuts – the “exit” side no vehicles parked there.  The broken up snow we could deal with.  He was then going to do the same with the “entrance” side of our driveway,  but -

The plow was coming through again – he was waiting across the street to come back, but someone got out of the plow truck and talked to him and apparently told him he had to leave!  

So the cut we had just cleared had snow in it again and we still had the second cut to clear.  We recleared this cut (and we have to be careful not to block the adjacent driveway of our neighbor, about 2 ft away from ours, when we clear ours).  We then went to the other side – husband pushed our snowblower into the snow again and again and would break apart part of what was there until we able to clear a path through the packed snow that looked wide enough for the car to fit through.  

Well, it is wide enough if we make a left turn into the driveway from across the street so that we come in straight.  Monday he cleared a bit more away from our “exit” cut so we could leave on a bit of an angle.  

More snow might be coming early to mid week next week!  

THOUGHT OF THE WEEK -
One can only do their best – we still have a lot of untouched snow around the driveway near our house as we did not need it cleared.  

Sometimes “angels” appear to help.

MOTHER NATURE DOES NOT HAVE A SENSE OF HUMOR

 Well, that relatively small snow storm that was headed our way changed from under 6 inches to 6 to 12 inches and came in at more than that.  Around here generally the largest amount of snow falls “to the north and west” - ie.  inland.  A big deal was made that this storm was to have the heaviest snow to the south and east – ie. closest to the ocean.  

The storm started overnight Saturday to Sunday (late enough that we were able to go out to pick up Chinese food for dinner as we have been doing on Saturday nights.  When I put the kitchen garbage in the outside pail around 10 pm light snow was starting to fall.  It snowed steadily on Sunday.  It snowed heavily on Monday.  It snowed lightly on Tuesday.  After putting that garbage in the pail Saturday night we stayed in the house until yesterday (Tuesday) when we started to clear the snow.  We managed to move the thigh high snow in the original driveway cut by chopping it down with the shovel and blowing it to the side of the driveway and move the snow between the car and the sidewalk with the blower.  Our neighbor on that side of our house had cleared the sidewalk across that part of our driveway (on his side) with his heavier duty snow blower for us – how nice of him (yes, I sent an email thanking him) – this being an oddity as normally no one helps us.  We were working on clearing the driveway as very light snow fell.  

How much snow did we get here (as opposed to any point on Long Island, NYC, upstate NYS, NJ or CT or anywhere else this storm hit?  Hard to say.  When we went out today (Wednesday) the snow between our house and the circular part of our driveway was maybe 4 inches.  The snow across the circular part – next to the (more or less) center semi circle of the driveway (and where we park our van) was around 18 inches high.  The snow had been blowing so if take an average it was around 11 inches – the storm dropped 30 inches in at least one community.  The snow in the two driveway cuts was close to 3 feet high.  Even after the snow had stopped and the road was clear – the snow plows, sand trucks, and salt trucks kept coming.  At 11 am this morning the road was again plowed.

So, today when we went out to clear the other (about) 2/3 of the driveway – including the second cut – the first cut into the street had been partially refilled and we had to clear out that side again.  With no more snow falling it seemed easier to blow the snow – then again, I was not the one pushing it most of the time – when it was hard to push into the packed snow we each took a side and both pushed.  We started probably around 12:30 after eating an early lunch and finished close to 5 pm.  

The news reports had been saying to expect 2 more snow storms – one at the end of this week and another on Monday.  Luckily they have changed to a light storm at the end of the week and maybe rain on Monday.  

We are also dealing with a second situation. When we went to the doctor in November he changed the dosage of one of my husband's medications – no refills, husband is suppose to come back after 90 days to have more blood taken to see if the new dosage is correct.  I was very careful to count when he had to go back – next Monday or Tuesday - for the blood test.  As husband has been sitting here in a panic over all the snow for the past 2 weeks he is also in a panic as to when we will get to the doctor for the test between all the storms (and he does not like to drive in snow) and then go a few days later when the doctor gets the results to pick up his prescription (as well as some other prescriptions we need to renew).  Since we can now get the car out of the driveway (unless they plow yet again) I will get up early tomorrow (for us) and call to see if he can go for the blood test tomorrow.  

THOUGHT OF THE WEEK -

An old adage is “Never put off until tomorrow what you can do today.”  I have changed it to “Never put off until tomorrow what needs to be done and cannot be if it snows tomorrow.”  If we had gone last week to the doctor the blood test would be done with and the prescriptions renewed and we would not have to worry about weather permitting us to do both. 

THE SIDE PORCH

I actually got something done this week - last Saturday when we got home I ended up dealing with the porch.  We have a small enclosed entryway to our kitchen door which in the most technical sense is our “porch”.  It is aluminum with screens on the top half of the walls.  It has a shelving unit with cabinet doors on the bottom of it on the wall between the door to the outside (facing the street) and the door to the kitchen.  On the back wall there is my husband’s boyhood work bench.  This has a shelf under it the top which holds a box for recycling of cans and bottles - just stick my hand out the kitchen door and toss in and I stack the newspapers on top of it for same.  There is a small garbage pail between the house wall and the table where I toss the soda bottles for return for deposit.  It also has some other storage items.  The rest of the porch is filled with stuff.  There is a narrow pathway from the door to door. 

What is in it which takes up so much more of the space?  Well, I tossed the plastic chair which was in the far corner years ago so that’s gone. I admit that much of this mess is mine.  I keep empty cardboard boxes to use to put out the recycling.  Our township gave out special green  plastic square boxes to put the recycling in (cans and bottles) when the program first started.  When we bought the house the box came with it.  I would dutifully put it out with our cans and bottles weekly and put the newspapers, tied in a stack (sometimes two stacks or more if I had been clearing out papers or it had been raining heavily or snowing the week before) either next to it or in it every week.  If we have a lot of snow it is a problem putting it out as where it goes cannot be reached if there is mounds of snow - sometimes I will leave it in our driveway cut, sometimes I hold onto it for the next week.  Nice and easy.

I am pretty sure that I mentioned that we live on a main, 4 lane road.  The sanitation workers did not neatly place the box back where it belonged on our property, they would drop it in the road.  Cars would hit it.  Eventually it was in pretty bad shape - even taped back together and it disappeared - my assumption being that the sanitation workers took it.  I called the department and they told me to come and pick up a new one.  So I drove down - about half an hour each way - to get a new box.  In the interim they had made the box larger.  The new box did not fit in the work bench.  Big problem - it did not fit anywhere usable and we could not figure out what to do with it.  Shortly after my sister-in-law was selling her late mother’s house and I had an idea.  My in-laws never believed in recycling so they had their box as originally given to them sitting in the garage.  I took my large one and exchanged it for their smaller one.  Worked well for us and the people in the house would probably have children and need the larger box anyway.  Well at some time since this box also was destroyed by being thrown in the street and disappeared I had to come up with a new idea.  (In the interim the sanitation department had dropped off the new, even larger, full garbage can sized recycling can which sits tossed behind the garage ever since as it would hold 2 months of our cans and bottles.  What really annoyed me about them leaving this can was it was left on the driveway, in front of the house - if only they did that with the boxes when I was using them - at the start of July that year - when people like us are away and it stands there as beacon that the house is empty.)

My solution has been to use cardboard boxes that come into the house to hold the recycling.  The box itself is recyclable so they just take it all.  To do this I hold onto cardboard boxes as we get them - small ones such as cereal boxes are good when I just have 4 soup cans and so on up to larger size boxes which can take a couple (few?) weeks worth when I have not have not been able to put out the recycling. (Really big ones can be cut in half to use for 2 weeks.)  They were all just  tossed and a mess.

I have not had a chance to return soda bottles and cans since doing so at the start of December.  Weather, things that needed to be done, etc. after my embroidery guild meeting had stopped me from me from doing so.  I had 3 large clear garbage bags with same floating about the porch. 

There are also several large spray bottles for poison ivy, killing weeds, etc. floating on the floor of the porch.  A couple of them are empty - but we were not sure how to dispose of them as they are “hazardous substances” and cannot go in the garbage.  (Since clearing the porch out a bit last weekend I have checked and they can only be returned at “STOP” events (stop throwing out poisons).  So we have to make a note and get out early enough to get to one - hopefully the July one as the June one is not near us and the July one is. 

Using a small plastic bag I was going to throw out I moved these into the far corner of the porch after I cleared out a full large garbage bag that was sitting there, I then put the plastic bags of soda bottles behind the bottles so both are out of the way.  The cardboard boxes which were kept were put on top of the same bags.  We had a large garbage bag in the middle of the porch to toss, well, garbage into.  That was moved further into this corner. 

We have a short office paper sized garbage pail in the porch.  I put our spare, sealed bag of snow salt in it and then put the started bag on top of it.  (The other spare bags are in the snow blower shed outside this porch.) 

We have a kitchen sized garbage pail in the porch which holds some of the assorted, brooms and shovels in the porch - I added some more of the lighter weight ones into it.  The three snow shovels should go into that same shed until next winter. 

Well, the porch is not really cleared out (I did not go through the large shelving unit, but much, if not all, of what is on the open shelf areas is needed and I did fell like going into the doored section - especially since I had not intended to do any of this) but it is so much better.  We can easily walk through it. 

The garbage bags were put out by the garbage pail that actually holds garbage outside the house - next to the snowblower shed.  Garbage pick up would be Monday and it could not go out to the curb before Sunday night.  I had 2 large black bags of garbage and a smaller white kitchen can sized one also.  I also had two relatively small filled bags with pieces of our driveway in them.  (One area of our driveway is falling apart and we can keep picking up the pieces as we are afraid that in winter if we use the snow blower it will send the pieces flying.) So I put those two bags out also.  Sunday night when I put all this at the curb I also added the usual kitchen garbage bag.

I am also taking smaller bags of the soda bottles - one put in the car as one bag of bottles is returned to get them rid of them in small amounts.  Husband hates the entire process (see the comment about his family not recycling in the body of this post) and I had been saving them up to take monthly.  This has become a problem this year and I would not have a chance to do so again until September.  I plan to get rid of the bottles a small bag at a time.  Once we are caught up the same bag or less will be returned weekly.

THOUGHT FOR THE WEEK -

Sometimes when one never has time to do something, it suddenly becomes “oh carp, we have to do this NOW.”  If that happens do what needs to be done.  If you can prevent yourself from reaching that point - do it before it reaches that point.  Oh, and of course, the snow shovels still have not been put into the snow blower shed.






                               

CATCHING UP - THREE STEPS FORWARD AND ONE STEP BACK

I have been trying hard to catch up this week on everything since, I guess, the beginning of March.  Things are getting done, but then, of course, new things pop up.

I actually have the stuff on my desk down to 2 piles - to do and to scan.  The to “enter” pile is gone - yay! 

I managed to lower the to scan pile today - I scanned in the tables of contents for 5 issues of a history magazine I read.  (I scan in the table of contents of magazines we keep for research.  This allows me to either search all of the tables of contents in a file to see if there are any related articles to a specific subject or to “page” through all the tables of contents without having to take out all the magazines.)  I also quickly scanned in the instruction manuals for the two new outdoor light fixtures that we bought and installed.  Again, easier to find the instructions in a scanned file than by going through all the instruction books.  I deleted the instruction manual of light fixture that one of these replaced as it stopped working right and was tossed out after being replaced.  The other is a light in a place where we never had one before.  I marked the instruction books with the year and will put them in a file to toss at the end of next year, so I will have them for now if anything comes up and they have to be returned.  The replacement light is next to the side entry garage door and I scanned an enlarged copy of how to adjust the light (it is motion triggered), which husband sealed in plastic and we have put it in the garage for convenient access if needed.

My embroidery chapter is in the middle of the renewal period so I have that out in the “to do” pile as I will have to forward the dues collected for our National and our Region to them at the end of the month.  I also have not finished dealing with the renewals for our reenactment unit (also in the “to do” pile) - I have a few new members who I have to add our to our list (already sent their dues to the National of same so if they went to a National event they will be on the list of unit members).  I then have to make the membership lists for both groups for our members to use.  This is especially important for the reenactment unit as we have events coming up, as well as our monthly meeting and the unit commander needs the new members info so they receive their notices. 

I renewed medications for myself and my husband - we need to do so quarterly.  I waited a bit longer than normal due to everything else going on and our weekly boxes when filled by me last Saturday night were short some pills, that have now been added.  (I keep an additional week of pills laid out in our travel pill boxes so I could have pulled the needed pills from same if we had a problem getting them.  I keep the travel boxes filled as it makes it easier if I have a cold or such and husband has to fill the regular boxes that we use in the house for our pills - they are counted and sorted and he just needs to put them in the house boxes.  Houses boxes are in individual boxes - a weekly box by day  for each of us for morning bills - in our bedroom - an lunch and dinner box for each of us in the kitchen, and a bedtime box for husband in the kitchen.  The travel boxes are one set of boxes with separate sections for the times of day and can be removed from the tray which holds it. I put all of the pills for both of us in each day’s box so that pulling out the box has all our pills for the day - as opposed to the boxes we use in the house where each box has a week’s worth of pills for one of us for a certain time of day.  (I hope that makes sense.)


We are also in the middle of dealing with insurance for our reenactment unit.  One is an accident policy for our members (we do have black powder guns being used as well as an open fire at events) which, after discussion with the rest of the board during the year, we checked and we are increasing the very low coverage we had before.  That bill should be here soon as it is due this month.  The other policy is a liability policy for the unit.  We have been looking for a new insurance company.  The one we had up to last year is no longer writen in our state as of last year. We found this out at the last minute last year.  We found an alternative last year when we needed to find one extremely quickly.  We wanted to see what else was out there now that we had a chance, plus we figured that additional companies might now be writing policies in our state now that the company we used to have was no longer doing so - and they would have had time to start doing so.  Much effort and time has been put into this - mostly by husband - and after all this, the policy we found last year, is still the only alternative.

We did have a call from mom the other day asking us to come and do a favor for her.  She had gotten a delivery of a new paper shredder.  It had been left in front of her front door - so she could not open the door, so could we come and please bring it in for her.  We did so and husband also set up the shredder for her and made sure it worked - that took just over an hour. 

Husband also had us finish dewinterizing the RV water tanks.  This takes time to fill the tanks repeated times - first time with bleach added to the water and which is run the water lines of the RV, then let sit  and then let out through the clean water let out (as opposed to having to let it all into the dirty water tanks and then dump those tanks  - which cannot be let run into the street, as clean water from the clean water let out can be done).  The tanks are then refilled with plain, clean water and let out the clean water let out several times to get rid of the bleach taste/smell.  Wet job and time wasting, but needs to be done.

Today husband had a new project for us to do.  We siphoned out the gasoline in the snow blower into a gas “can”.  That gas and the gas left in the other can were poured into our cars for use.  The snow blower was then allowed to run to use up the gas in it.  If this is not done the gas in the snow blower goes bad over the summer and it cannot be started in the fall/winter for checking that it works and for us. 

But these odd tasks are getting done and the piles on the desk are going down. 

I also paid our business credit card bill today - out in the mail tomorrow and tomorrow afternoon our will pay our main credit card bill and it will go out in the mail on Friday - when we will also transfer money from savings to checking to cover it.  (The money to the business checking account to pay the business credit card was transferred last week.)  All bills are paid in full every time.  (Well 2 exceptions over the decades which had specific reasons not to pay in full.) 

THOUGHT FOR THE WEEK -

If you fall behind - slow and steady will get you caught back up even if new things pop up that have to be done.

OUTSIDE ORGANIZING

Well, after talking about our tiny bathrooms last week, I thought I would go more expansive this week - outside our house. 

As you may be able to figure since our house is small, the property it is on is also small.  Technically since the minimum land size to build on has increased since this house was built in the late 1940s/early 1950s we could not build on the land now as it is too small.  It is the sort of property that makes us very close (in distance at least) to our neighbors as their property is the same sixe.  It is maybe 25 feet from our driveway to the door of the house on one side.  The house on the other side is the same distance from us, but it feels like there is more room as neither of us has a driveway on that side.  Their family room starts about 5 feet from our property line.

The house came with a detached one and a half car garage and we added a shed behind it while we have been in the half.  We live on a main road - 2 lanes plus a parking lane in each direction.  The first year we were in the house we found out not to park my compact car (or anything else) in the street - we had to replace the driver’s side mirror twice.  As a result we had a semi-circular driveway put in - that takes up almost all of our front lawn space.  In the early years we made the mistake of planting grapes - we have not really had grapes from it (enough to make a cup of very strange, brown, grape jam), but it has taken over that side of the backyard and between that and the bushes and trees that were planted by the former owner we have a jungle on that side.  We also have for a few years now, poison ivy on that side that husband has to kill every summer - several times.

When we first moved in husband would cut the grass, but his allergies made it very hard for him.  We were both working full time so we decided to hire someone to cut grass and trim the bushes, get rid of leaves, etc.  I contacted 4 companies who work at various other houses in the area - one responded.  He had a problem with our property.  The side of the house (left) with no driveway had no access to the back yard.  The side with the garage did not have a wide enough entry to the back yard for his mowers.  So, we went out and cut a gate into the fence on the left side of the house.  This company took care of our property for some years - doing (and charging us for) much more than we wanted done.  When husband quit his job, we switched to the brother in law of his secretary and were much happier with him, but he “sold” us to someone else.  The new fellow was okay at first.  Since a time when we were almost “snowed out” of our house (we were away on a trip - back then staying in hotels - when an unexpected huge storm hit at home and we were not sure we would be able to up our driveway) we had the each of the three of them clear our snow in winter for us.  (Well worth the money.)  While the last fellow was cutting our grass, we had major storm one winter.   I mean MAJOR - we had not seen that much snow in one storm since we were children - if then.  No one came to clear it.  We tried to reach him.  His phone was discontinued.  We called the fellow who sold us to this one - he managed to find out that the fellow had gone home to South America for the winter - leaving us hanging.  I won’t go into the saga of trying to get someone to deal with the snow that winter - but the next winter the same happened after he said it would not and the following year he did not even come to mow, so we are back to doing the work ourselves.  I posted last winter of our adventures with snow about as big as just mentioned - maybe even deeper. 

So, allergies or no allergies, husband went back to cutting our grass.  Over the years it has gotten harder and harder for him as he does not have enough energy and I have been helping. Now remember, we basically have no front lawn due to our driveway.  We have the grass at the curb and the semi circle of the driveway (now our van is parked there) and the grass on the side of the house without a driveway - at the street end the grass is maybe a foot across, so basically it is our backyard.     

Last year he took stuff to kill weeds and killed the grass (and weeds) along the curb and in the semi circle so we don’t have to mow it.  One year we will get the semi circle paved and that will help in more ways than one.

This year to make it easier we bought an electric mower.  It is lighter and we don’t have to deal with gas for it.  We have used it twice.  It has a piece hanging that one is suppose to feed the electric cord through to hold it in place - to help not run over it when mowing.  But, it is too small for the size cord one is suppose to use, so husband has made an adjustment to it, even so it is a problem with the cord hanging.  So I walk a distance away from where he is working and hold the cord, so it is not on the ground.     

Our garage is actually husband’s wood workshop.  It being a small space for same, we have all of the larger power tools on wheels.  They sit along the perimeter of the garage walls and pull out to be used.  It is a mess in there right now - has been for a few years.  We really need to take time to get it cleaned up and back to where it was when we set it up - nice and organized.  When we first set it up we bought a through the wall air conditioner for it - or husband would not be able to work in there when it is hot.  When the fellow came to install it he was surprised and said that he had never installed an air conditioner in a garage before.  We also had a door put in.  A door put in - huh?  Well it had the large door for cars, but no other door.  We used to store all of the Christmas stuff on boards attached to the rafters.  We would bring the boxes into the house and set up the decorations and put the boxes back in the garage.  One winter it was very wet and very cold - the large rolling garage door froze to the ground and we were not able to store the Christmas decorations until spring - and did not take them down as they would have taken up more room lying about.  So we had a door put in where the window used to be and had a better window put in.  We also had to put in electricity and walls.  (Perhaps that misadventure in construction another time.)  We bought hanging space heaters to heat it winter. 

The shed holds stuff for our craft business for when we used to do shows  - tables, tents, etc.  It has the middle seat of our van (we don’t need it in the van).  It has our outdoor Christmas decorations, although lately we have used new ones which are in basement - along with the other Christmas stuff these days.  (It became harder and harder for him to climb up and take it all down. Just our lights are in the garage these days.)  Garden tools - mostly that we no longer use - are in it.  It also has husband’s toys that he took when his mother died and her house was sold - mostly he planned to sell them, but his electric trains are in there too.     

We have a small shed next to our garage.  It was intended to hold our bicycles.  It does - although we really should sell them.  It also holds our old and new mowers and trimmer. 

Our latest addition is a small shed next to the house in front of the side door.  It holds our snowblower - or else we would have to shovel our way to the garage to get it out when needed.  It also has two gas cans (currently empty as it is warm out) and for now, the snow shovels. 

That leaves a small enclosed area at our side door of the house that we call “the porch”.  It is used for storage of various items for gardening, items for our RV, items for taking care of the vehicles, snow shovels (although new place for them these days) and large garden shovels.  It has a small square garbage pail (the sort one would find inside the house) for our soda bottles for recycling next to the door to the house.  It also has husband’s boyhood work bench.  This has a box in it to collect cans and bottles for recycling and the newspapers are stacked on the top.  I keep cardboard boxes in it to throw out and use same to put out the cans and bottles - and then they take the box also.  It has a large plastic storage piece with doors on the bottom 2 shelves and 2 open shelves above.  This is where the all the small items are kept for the chores mentioned above.  We have a couple of bags of salt for snow.  There is also a large garbage bag.  This sounds organized, but is actually a giant mess. I keep planning to clear it out and organize it - but it is either too hot or too cold to work in it. 
                       
THOUGHT OF THE WEEK -

Where items outside the house are stored is as important as where items are stored inside the house.  One needs to figure out what one needs - or wants - to have and make arrangements for them to be stored and as easily accessible as possible.

It is easier to set up a plastic shed in warm weather than cold as the plastic is more pliable.  (We had to wait a year for the shed for the snow blower as we waited too long and, per the manufacturer,  it was too cold to set it up.)  Think ahead if you will plan to store winter items in a shed and get it set up before it is too cold. 

VERY COLD START TO THE NEW YEAR

Being in the northeast US we had a terribly cold start to the year, well, technically it also ended 2017.  It has been (according to the weather reports) the 3rd longest period with the temperature below freezing for this area since records were kept.  I know many of you will scoff at this as the temperature where you are is (much) more often below freezing, but luckily for us, not that common here.  Add to the unusually cold weather strong winds - in some areas wind chills were below 0 Fahrenheit - again I know elsewhere this is not that unusual. 

As you know from last week’ post, we had a snow storm last Thursday.  Due to the cold weather, the snow has stayed.   - I must make a correction to last week’s post - I mentioned that a neighbor had helped us removes snow from one of the driveway cuts.  I assumed (and you know what that means) that it was the neighbor who lived in the house immediately next to us on that side as he had been helping, what I thought was his wife.  I was surprised as the neighbor has had back problems and even asked about same and he told me that he was fine.  I later telephoned him and thanked him again.  The next day I received an email from his wife - the neighbor had not been the one who helped us - he was in the house as he cannot leave same due to his back problem.  The neighbor on the other side of her house - who we have never even met before (it is a main street and therefore we only know the neighbors on either side and one house to the other side, but that is due to a shared car accident by a 3rd party).  Even nicer of him to have helped.  She did not know his telephone number or email so I am going to write a thank you note.  So, thank you, Dave! - Oh, and we did find the nut that goes with the handle that fell off the snow blower.

We stayed in the house on Friday for the entire day as it was the coldest day of this period of subfreezing weather.  I took advantage of this time in the house to finally finish putting up my Christmas decorations - yes, on the twelfth and last day of Christmas I set up my teddy bear village!  It is now setup and we are enjoying it.  My normal time to start take down the other decorations is this coming Monday, but I may leave them up a few extra days - I will ask husband what he thinks and if he is ready.  Between his worrying over the weather and our “visit to the 18th century” we have not really had a chance to look at them The village always stays up longer.

I checked with my mom  - 88 years old - tonight to make sure she has groceries, heat, running water, etc. and she does.  I asked if she needs anything and she told me no, she has groceries for at least another week and she is sure the snow will melt by then.  She cannot open her front door as there is snow against it, but is sure after tomorrow (it is suppose to be 50 degrees Fahrenheit and to rain tomorrow) she will be able to open her door.  I made her promise (which she would never keep) to call me if she needs food or help getting out.  She is our only parent left.

Another followup to the snow removal story.  When we put out our outdoor Christmas lights husband placed a strand on a low bush next to the steps to our door.  He was draping them around the front of the bush.  I suggested that maybe we did not want them that far forward and reminded him that once when we had someone to clear the snow, they ran the snow blower over the lights on that bush.  He did not remember.  Before the snow came I suggested that I unplug all the outside lights - afraid that water might get into the lights and short them out - maybe even start a fire.  Husband instead turned off the breaker to that circuit.  (The front outdoor outlet is on its own circuit as is the back outdoor outlet.)    Good thing.  As I mentioned last week husband ran over the Christmas light strand with the snow blower and we found pieces of the wire as far away as the other side of our small property).   We have basically just left the snow as it was after we cleared it then as it was too cold and we were too discouraged to do anything about it.  Today the temperature was in the upper 30s.  Husband decided that the snow would not melt properly and he would blow some more of the snow out of the driveway cuts so that it would spread around more and melt faster.  In addition we are suppose to clear the sidewalk in front of our house and had not done so - too much work and anyone can use our driveway to get from one side to the other.  But, he also had not cleared the driver’s side of our van and to use it one needed to go in through the passenger side to get to the driver’s seat and he found it cumbersome, the time he tried moving the van to see if would move.  So he decided to clear the sidewalk now, which would also give him access to the driver’s side of the van.  (Normally the van sits there, but I need to go to a client next week and if the van is frozen in, he has no way to go out for lunch or to amuse himself while I have the car.)  He was doing okay, but then the snow blower started to make funny noises and sort of “buck’.  He pulled the snow blower to a spot on the driveway that was clear and shut it off.  He looked inside (with a little shovel stick that came with the blower) - nothing stuck.   He had me lay down the blower for him - handle to the ground and found the problem.  Apparently much more of the light strand had been pulled by the blower and it was wrapped around both sides of the axle of the blower’s wheels.  About 15 minutes later - with the help of needlenose pliers and a wire cutter - the blower was fixed. 

Instead of going in, husband decided to clear the snow off the windshield and hood of our RV (remember this is a Chevy van).  It would not move.  I suggested starting the engine - by logic and what I have seen happen before - this would heat the snow on the bottom and it would slide off the hood easily - if not on it’s own.  He insisted that would not work and kept pushing until he removed enough to make him happy.

THOUGHT OF THE WEEK -

Okay two of them -

First, unplug or shut off the power to your Christmas lights before using a snow blower near them.

Second - Keep yourself, your loved ones, and your home warm in cold weather so that all survive safely. 

18 CENTURY, SNOW STORM AND NEW YEAR

Sorry to be late again.  I am still running terribly behind where I should be due to the holidays, I guess.

The reenactment event we did last week is usually a nice simple, although time consuming, event to do.  It has been one of my favorites every year.  It was an unusually cold week for around here.  Normally the weather should be above freezing here in December, one night last week was 9 degrees Fahrenheit and on the final day of the event it snowed.  While it is an 18th century house it does have a furnace in the basement and we also make a fire in the kitchen fireplace. This kitchen is unusual for the period as it is in the house - at least as it is set up to be interpreted by the restoration.  Normally we are comfortable in the house, but this year it was cold in the house - so cold that husband (with his cold) actually asked to switch rooms with me during the last 2 nights as the room he was in was too cold for him.  So he got to talk about our musicians/singers, the odd cabinet bed in the room, the kitchen, and Sinter Klaus (there is a display table related) while I got to talk about the owner’s office and the 2 bed chambers - he likes doing the back rooms as he can talk more about anything he wants to than in the kitchen where there are things to be covered in talking. We even brought plain knit gloves the last two nights to keep our hands warm in the house.  Our unit is lucky - we are in the first house in the village so we have the shortest walk from the visitors’ center in the cold.  One thing which surprised me was how many people came out in the terrible cold - and many brought very small children and babies. 

So after “spending” 5 days in the 18th century, I was behind on everything.  I have since read 9 newspapers, caught up on a week’s worth of email and mail, caught up on my online groups - one of which moved to a new setup and I had to join and setup my account all over again, plus doing all of same that has come in since. 

We had been told that we were to have snow from early this morning (Thursday) through the day.  Where we are was suppose to get about 4 inches.  Husband now panics over bad weather.  I had my embroidery chapter meeting yesterday so on Tuesday I told him that we should buy whatever he wants or feels we need to have for a snow day.  We bought stuff.  I told him that I would go to the meeting (which is actually in extended walking distance from our house) and would not stay for the class on stitches after the meeting part.  I did make one stop after - I exchanged USB stick drives in our bank vault - I use same for offsite data storage, which is changed once a month. (When he went to work, I would send the drive to work with him and he would bring the old one home with him for reuse.)  I then came home.  We ended up going to Walmart, the adjacent supermarket and the Walmart supermarket here.  (Our regular Walmarts have small food departments, but not the supermarket areas that they do in other places  - the Walmart supermarket is smaller than the sections elsewhere and is only a supermarket and pharmacy.)  When we came home we went into “horrible weather mode”.  All of laptops and cell phones were plugged into charge (and have stayed same since) and he had bought two devices to recharge cell phones, so those were plugged in also so they would be fully charged.  Normally I would move anything in the middle of the traffic patterns in rooms out of same - but the living room and dining room where this is mostly done were still neat from the holidays. This way if we did lose electricity it is easier to walk around in dim light and not walk into anything.  (For us, we are still in the holidays.)    
                                       
When we went to bed last night, the snow had gone up a bit in how much we would get, as it had shifted further west.  (Those of you in the South or the Northeast part of the U.S. who were hit by this storm, you have my sympathy.)  The weather reporters has also started talking about blizzard and nor’easter (think hurricane with snow in cold weather).  But, he had not panicked and I was glad of that. When I went to sleep around 4:30 am, there were still no school closings showing up on the local news.           

Well, it ended up that this area had over 10 inches of snow - in bitter cold weather.  It finally stopped snowing around 4pm and based on the suggestion from the weather reporters, as well as husband’s need to do so, we went out to clear our driveway.  Our neighbors on either side were also doing so (they are young with young children - we are old with no children).  And shortly after the neighbor’s son from two doors over (in his 20s) came out with some friends to dig out their cars.  Our driveway is semi circular.  It goes from one edge of our property to the other so just figuring out where to put snow is hard.  Husband used the lightweight snow blower we bought last year.  I used a shovel and a brush - the latter to clear off our car.  We were out there about 2 hours doing this.  Husband had trouble with one of the cuts to the street (4 lane road so we get 2 driving lanes plus a parking lane’s worth of snow plowed over on same) and had me cutting it down with the shovel (breaking the snow loose so it would spread over more area and easier for him to throw) while he worked on the other cut.  The neighbor on that side who has a larger snow blower, came and cleared it for us.  (Thank you again Sal!!!).  I cleared half the stair case to our front door so the mailman could get to the box (I have no idea if we got mail today - I was not going to look - we did get a newspaper, but I forgot to take it in and was not going back out for it) and also cleared the snow all the way across the top step so that the door would open in an emergency. 

Finally exhausted we came back into the house.  I could not feel my toes.  Husband looked as if he would pass out.  We lost a small piece off the snow blower - a knob - which we have lost before, found it, but are still missing the nut to it and hope to find it tomorrow when it is light out.  (By 4 pm when we started it was dark out - and our garage light is on a motion detector, so when it went out one of us had to run to where it would go back on.)  When he was coming to the end of the snow clearing he heard a noise in the blower which upset him - we later found out, he ran over the Christmas lights on one of the low bushes - good thing I told him to shut off the electricity to the lights last night.  Schools are already closed for tomorrow.  The weather is suppose to remain 15 degrees F or less until at least Monday, so there will be a lot of ice on the driveway.

I had told him to do a bit of the snow clearing, then in the house and rest a bit.  But, being a man, it all had to be done at once, of course.

After dinner I went upstairs and did the paperwork I planned to do today and never got to.  Moving some money around to pay bills, paying the bills, and a birthday card for my brother in law and one for the daughter of the neighbor who helped us out.  Both birthdays are Monday and one bill is due out by then - not sure if we will get to the post office (and bank) in time for them to go out before Monday, but if they can, we are ready. 

THOUGHT FOR THE WEEK -

We had a quiet New Year’s Eve. 

The way I look at it, every day is the start of a New Year.  I don’t make resolutions - the last one I made I have kept ever since, it was not to make any more resolutions.  I look for what I can do (or not do) and then do my best to follow up.  Resolutions are usually to broad to be followed and then one feels bad for not doing so. 

And if you make resolutions and don’t keep them - remember every day is the start of a new year and one can start fresh.

Happy New Year.






Well, storms do not always do what they are predicted to do, and we got 10 inches!  We had spent

       

I HATE THE AFTERMATH OF TRIPS

Just in case anyone was wondering - after a week my head barely hurts if I touch where I hit it last week.  ( I mean if I touch my head where it was hurt, not the board I hit it on.)     My dad, a man of great wisdom, would say - “If your head hurts when you touch it, then don’t touch it.

The worst part of a trip, to me, is when I come home I have to do everything I didn’t do while away (and, of course, things I didn’t do before we went away).  Husband never understands this idea.

We are pretty good at emptying out the RV when we return home - I have a system.  There are two plans for emptying it, the regular plan and the “its raining and we can’t bring it all in plan”. In the normal plan, I start packing stuff and husband becomes a beast of burden running it all into the house.  I am basically working in sections in a circle around where I am standing in the RV. First is the refrigerator, followed by food in plastic boxes in the cabinet. Husband will unpack the refrigerator items into the one in the house.  I shut off the refrigerator in the RV and put a thick towel under the freezer section just in case any ice buildup melts and drips.  (It does not have a separate freezer section, but a “cold” box as refrigerators did in “the olden days” - like the 1950s.  Ice cream purchased in the evening will be soft ice cream when eaten at 2 am - cold soup beyond that. I take the batteries of the refrigerator thermometer and its remote read device.

The towels are added to the laundry bag of clothes and when the bag goes into the house it is tossed down the stairs to the basement.  I pack the clean clothes (we always over pack - doesn’t everyone) and bring an extra day or two of clothes in case something happens to something we are wearing while away and we need to change clothes unexpectedly, they go into the other laundry bag and go by the stairs in the house so they go up the same night.   Jackets, sweatshirts and such are taken in loose.  Shoes are put into supermarket/Walmart shopping bags to be taken in. 

Husband will take various laptops and other devices into the house in a couple of trips. Similarly he will take in my embroidery holder. The “last minute bag” is pulled out from under the bed and the items removed from it go back into it. This trip we also pulled toothpaste and such as we don’t want to leave them in all winter - we did that the first year and they did not survive well.
                                   
Any items we purchased while away and stored inside the main part of the TV are brought into the house and left on the table to be sorted and stored. (Hey, I just noticed that sorted and stored are anagrams - the same letters rearranged - is why they go together so well?)

On the “third seat” (seat behind the front passenger seat) we have a pocket with a folder in it which holds papers we pick up during the trip - tourist handouts, maps, local tourist magazines, and such, as well as magazines we brought from home to read - they go in similar bag to the shoes. 

Assorted spare eyeglasses (reading, sun, etc.) that are needed and/or kept elsewhere are removed from the glove compartment as are the snacks I keep in the front door map pocket in case of a glucose low for either of us while in transit. In there is also the coupon holder from our car (if I need, for example, tissues while away, why shouldn’t I have the coupon with me to use) and the travel related coupons we brought with us. My old Palm and Blackberry cell phones which come along for the trip for other features of the phones have to be removed also.  The EZ Pass (to pay tolls electronically) is removed from the windshield and stored away. 

The various curtains in the RV are closed. The lights are shut off and the RV battery is shut off.

Between trips with items I had for him, husband has removing items we purchased and stored in he back of the RV (technically under the head of the bed) and adding them to what is on the kitchen table in the house.

I stop and get the mail from our mailbox on the way in.  If it is a short trip and we did not stop the newspaper (yes, I still get and read a newspaper) I will bring them in also.

If it is raining - the food and stuff in the last minute bag go in and not much else unless it is needed.

Now I enter the house kitchen .  I have to sort what has come in - food which does not need to be in the refrigerator goes on the counter.  Food that goes in the refrigerator should already have been put there by Robert.  Clean clothes, laptops & similar, mail, shoes, and such are put on the stairs or adjacent to them to be taken upstairs.  Jackets and such are put in the front closet - or at least over the post at the foot of the stairs in the front hall.  And the pile of stuff on the table.

The stuff on the table has to be sorted - stuff to go upstairs, stuff to stay in the kitchen/dinning room, stuff for the basement, stuff for our studio - or the garage workshop.  I sort them into shopping bags and try to at least get them into the room they belong in - or hang them on the door knob to outside if the item goes outside. 

But of course this is just the first step.  The next day I will have to go through the mail- shred the junk mail, pull out and check bills, collect bank statements (if any) to reconcile, magazines to where they will be read, and so on.  We will also go to the Post Office and pick up the mail which has accumulated in our box there, which also has to be sorted.

Food in boxes will have to be stored - I tend to do it slowly and use what is in the boxes.  They are basically snacks so I use the cereal which was not used on the trip instead of storing it away, use the tea bag from the ones I brought with us, etc. 

Since this was our last trip of the year that we will make with running water in the RV, I said to husband that I presume we will winterize the RV this week - he said we could wait.  For those who might not understand this, in areas like this where it can get close to freezing and below it, the water pipes and valves might freeze and break.  So we have to run a non-toxic anti freeze, made for this purpose for RVs and boats, through the water system.  This keeps it all from freezing, but also means that we cannot use the system as that would be adding water which could freeze back in the system.  Well, the not so cold weather we were having and were to have is to change by this weekend.  So the winterizing must be done this week. 

In addition, we needed a small closet type shed to keep our snowblower in by our side door.  (It is currently in the garage workshop and not only does it take up room, but if it snow we have to shovel our way to the garage and clear a path in front of the garage door so a shed near the door would be very good to have.)  Last year we waited too long to buy one - they have to be assembled above a certain temperature so that plastic gives and bends and does not break in the assembling.  Husband kept forgetting to order one from a well known home store and finally decided this was it.  We wanted to order one to pick up at the store.  The program would not let us as it said the store already had “one”.  So we went to the store.  It took about an hour and a half for them to find the shed, get someone to take it down from the top shelf (maybe 20 feet or more up), us to take it to the register and pay for it (well, husband did while I got the van), have no one come to help us load it, realize the box inside the sealed plastic was soaked, find the assistant manager again, get the other one (yes, per the computer they had one, but actually they had two), and get someone to help us load it.  It then sat in our van on the driveway until we could assemble it. 

Monday was too cold, Tuesday it rained.  (And of course we went and voted Tuesday.)So today we assembled it - mostly.  We had to get the huge box out of our van - we managed to push it so it was in the rear of the van (behind the back seat) and on a work stand and unloaded.  Today was already getting colder so we took all the pieces into the garage and turned on the hanging space heaters to keep the plastic pieces warm and pliable.  We moved our car to the curved part of our driveway, then backed the RV to the spot the car normally is so we would have room to work.  Somehow we were able to assemble most of the shed.  Husband then got ill from bending over, as he does, and had to go in and go to sleep for awhile.  I finished getting the roof ready to go on - screwing parts onto the inside of the room, putting things into the body of the shed to hold the roof in place, putting the handles on the doors.  (The doors were about the worse part of the assembly except...) When it was all done, I went and woke husband who after about a half hour more, was able to come out and we put the roof on - yay!  The last thing which had to be done and is a problem is two metal bars have to be slid into the roof and across into the sides to hold the front end of the roof on - we got one in, then gave up and will try again tomorrow as it was getting colder and dark. 

Remember he said that we don’t have to winterize this week when I said I assumed we were going to?  Tomorrow we will be winterizing the RV.

Luckily when he said that we would be doing these “little chores” today and tomorrow, I managed to write checks for all bills due out on Friday and figure out how much we have to transfer into checking to cover them - it is all finished and sitting in my “out” box for Friday.

THOUGHT FOR THE WEEK - When going on a trip - even a short, relatively local one as we take - try to be as caught up as possible before the trip.  Try to plan when you will catch up on bills, other paperwork, unpacking, laundry (I am doing a week and a half’s laundry tonight and tomorrow night), and such, when you return.     
           
For those who are Veterans or who are still on active service, Friday is Veteran’s Day here in the U.S. and is a holiday for many of those who live in the World War II allies countries (Armistice Day, Remembrance Day...) as Saturday is November 11, I thank you all for your service to your country  - whether the U.S. or other.  For those of you still on active service, I wish you a safe tour and return home.