Bank On It!

Another snow storm is on its way.

We already have this on the deck outside the upstairs studio.

My workplace has pretty much the same thing happening.

Later on our deck, after a few hours of shoveling.

Snow Daze

Above is this mornings weather report. It's only partially the amount of snow, but the high winds will make it very bad white-out conditions. Yesterday afternoon I was hearing how New York was shutting down the subways today, Massachusetts the highways, town after town here in Maine announcing closures and not to expect their snow removal services to be doing much when blind. Carrie's job even called her to tell her not to bother coming in today. But Governor Lepage was being quiet. I fully expected he was going to leave State Offices open until we were in the midst of the worst of the blizzard today and then announce closings.

Fortunately he did make the announcement before I tried to leave this morning. We'll let the storm hit and hope it slacks off later today to allow us to use the snowblower.

For now, it's a stay inside day.

Dreaming of a White Thanksgiving

Enjoying the morning together before Carrie heads to work.

I did 2 passes yesterday, and this is our third clearing of the driveway.

Morning light on the back yard.

Persephone watches our antics but stays warm inside.

The Snow Must Go On

Sunday morning snow

Eye Sage

 All but the last of these pictures were taken just after our recent ice storm. The last was after the following snow storm.

Standing in the street you can glimpse our house through the trees.

A closer view from our driveway.

Everything got coated in ice.

A very thick coating of ice.

These tracks prove neither ice nor snow will keep the squirrels away from the bird feeders.

click on any ice cube to enlarge the photo

Celebrating Spring!

Another storm hit the area yesterday. Lots of places were closed early or for the entire day, but not State Offices. Left work a little after 5PM as usual and drove slowly toward home. The roads were poorly plowed most of the way, until I hit the street that leads to the steet I live on. That one wasn't plowed at all. Got stuck a couple of times driving along it, but nothing I had to get out of the car to undo.

Then I got to my street. Which is an undulating hill. Couldn't get up it. Got stuck twice trying to get back down. I finally got back to plowed streets and parked in the Post Office's parking lot.

I gave Carrie a call, expecting she would probably be late in getting home also, maybe even driving at the time. She would notice the call when she got home, so I needed to be patient and wait for her. Turns out she was already home, but didn't notice my call because she was busy with the snowblower clearing our driveway.

Carrie came in her nice 4 wheel drive Subaru. Heading home, the roads were a little better. Some were getting plowed, but not ours. We got home in time to eat and go to bed.

This morning the driveway needed another round with the snowblower, especially at the end as the snowplow finally did go by. After Carrie got herself ready for work she dropped me off at the Post Office with a snow shovel. I was glad to see my car had NOT been towed. Glad the parking lot had been plowed so I didn't have to dig a path all the way out to the street. Not so happy that snow had been plowed onto my car.

Asthma means I have to do physical exertions slowly. Even though the muscles are up to it, the lungs aren't. Slow and steady, no big deal, just tired afterward. Driving home I found the roads, though plowed, were still difficult. I did make it home, but almost slid off the road several times in spite of my slow speed.

I am home right now, catching my breath, getting ready to have some breakfast then a shower. I've let work know I am not going to be there this morning. We'll see how the roads are later and I might go in then.

Sunday your prints will come

We had a little snow during the day Saturday, and 2 or three inches overnight. Early this morning we must've had a cat visiting as evidenced by these fresh prints. Will we need to start leaving cat food out?

Snow Business like Shoe Business

Today's snowfall requires at least one pass of the snowblower on the driveway, but it also gives Carrie a chance to practice using some snowshoes she bought when we were living in Arizona.

Snow Wonder

It's another Saturday snowfall. It's been big fat flakes falling slowly, sticking to trees, but not too heavy. It has all but stopped for a bit, so I went out to shovel the driveway and walk through our own winter wonderland in the back. This shot is a view atop Weevil Hill, just inside the trees, looking back at our house. Click on a window to enlarge the whole scene.

The wonderful Blizzard of Ours

Lovely patterns in the snow.

Yesterday I waited until most of the day was over before going out to shovel. It looked, from inside the house, like the wind had shifted some of the little snow that had fallen here and there a bit on the driveway, so it should be an easy clear. Not so. The wind had blown bare a couple of spots which was what was mostly visible from the window, and piled up some of the couple of feet of snow we got high in other areas. Very much in the way of Carrie being able to leave for work this morning.

You can see the same effect at the back of our house. Some parts of the roof, and some of the ground right near the house, are swept almost clear. If you look carefully, which can be done better after clicking on the photo, you can see some of the snow is hanging over the right edge of the main building. You can also see some snow drifts up against the house. And note how my footprints in the snow get deeper as they approach the camera. At least it wasn't really heavy sticky wet snow.

I'll be out finishing off the driveway clearance throughout the day today. It's nice and sunny as you can tell from these 2 shots.

We're off to see the Blizzard

A brief interlude when the wind stopped blowing shows how some areas have had most or all the snow blown away, and huge drifts in others (mostly toward the right.) I took this shot from safely inside the house, and you can see a couple of lights reflected off the window I was looking through.

Yesterday, State offices closed at 3:00, so I was able to get home in time to shovel the driveway before it got dark clear enough for Carrie's arrival home. The snowfall and blowing wind since then has erased all evidence of my efforts.

Lots more snow expected today, and people are being told not to go anywhere unless it's an emergency. Massachusetts even has that as an executive order for their state. Fortunately I don't have to work on Saturdays and even more luckily, Carrie has been granted the day off as she has so far to travel to her job and no deliveries are expected anyway. She is rescheduled to go it tomorrow when it is supposed to be clear and sunny. I hope to take some pretty photos then.

White Dreams

Carrie & Ross in our back woods.

We have Ross up for his annual visit and were afraid he wasn't going to have a white christmas. The recent snow kept turning to rain and washing away. Today was supposed to be precipitation free, but look! It's snowing!

Snow Shoots

Three shots of the back yard and one showing the front of our house.


To enlarge any picture, click on your favorite snowflake in it.

"What does not destroy me, makes me stronger"

We had a very strengthening holiday weekend.

Wednesday morning we were up early in anticipation of needing to clear the driveway of accumulating snow due to the storm moving in. There was about 3 or 4 inches at this point. It was wet snow, so I needed to stop the snowblower to clear the clogged discharge chute. Restarting the blower, the pull cord snapped. The snow was still wet snow, so I still had to clear the discharge, but now I had to keep the blower running while I did so. Not as dangerous as it sounds as I could disengage the blades while keeping the motor running. However I had to keep a grip on the safety lever on the handle. You let go of the snowblower and it automatically shuts off. But the lever was diagonally opposite where the chute was, so a bit of a stretch and I was doing it one handed. A longer than anticipated time to do the driveway. Snow was still coming down, so by the time I was done there was another inch already on the part I first cleared.

In case you're wondering what Carrie was doing, she had a shovel and was doing touchup and clearing spots I couldn't use the blower on.

I had to work that day, so while I drove the hour and a half crawl in to work, Carrie first tried finding somebody to repair the snowblower. The machine is too big to fit in either of our vehicles, so we needed a housecall. The earliest anybody would get to us was Friday.

Carrie got to work to find somebody to plow the driveway. We expected about 12 inches on top of which the street plowing was sure to pile it in front of the driveway and I would need to get my car off the street. She did get someone who agreed to come out in a couple of hours. That was around 10:00 in the morning. A couple of couple of hours went by and she tried getting a hold of them again. Eventually they called her and Carrie now expected them at 5:30. Still plenty of leeway as I normally get out of work at 5:00 and was going to be driving slowly home afterwards.

As I pulled up to our driveway in the dark, I saw Carrie shoveling snow. I put on my hazard lights and got out to help. We cleared enough to get my car off the road.

The plower called later on saying they would be here in 15 minutes. They finally showed up around 7:30. And did a lousy job.

During the day, between calls, Carrie noticed her truck had a flat. She got out the jack and spare tire and started to change it. But for some reason, her jack would not lift the truck high enough for the spare tire to have room to be put on. I asked if it could wait until morning for me to tackle it.

Thanksgiving morning I got out my car's jack and used it on a piece of wood to raise the truck off Carrie's jack. I intended to put hers up on some bricks to get enough height to put the spare on. But the truck decided to shift forward, bending my jack and falling off it. Adrenaline rush as it topples in front of my eyes and I know I cannot catch it in my bare hands as much as my impulse tells me to. Argh! Guilt because it's Carrie's truck!

Carrie's jack caught the truck frame in a different spot before the wheel hit the cement floor. Whew! So I had to use the 2 jacks in a series of careful lifts to get the truck high enough and another series to lower the truck back down. My jack still works, but it's a lot more difficult to raise and lower it along the new bend. I went back inside and changed out of my now filthy clothes.

Every Thanksgiving since we moved to Maine, Kemmer has come up to visit and this year was no exception. The drive up from Massachusetts was pretty easy until she got off the highway and noted how the roads could use another plowing. As she signaled her turn into our driveway she hit an especially slick spot and spun, almost into a tree. The poor plowing job left enough snow in the way to stop her car before reaching the tree. With the help of a neighbor we dug and pushed the car out of the snow bank and she got safely into our drive.

We didn't wait too long to head out for our dinner. Carrie had won a free Thanksgiving Dinner for two at the Hilton Garden Inn in Auburn. We figured to get a plush meal for three at the price of one. The main course of turkey was actually turkey loaf! Other parts of the meal seemed equally fabricated. They actually had some fresh vegetables and fruit for salad makings that was almost the only thing that wasn't extremely disappointing. It was buffet style and my first round I loaded up on meat and starch. My second round had fruit and veggies.

They had live music there. After my stint working in a mall I can usually tune background music out, but the faces Kemmer kept making about it made me alert to it as well. And it was pretty bad.

Kemmer and Carrie had a girls day out to go to a couple of farm stands' last sales and a visit to the Cora Shriner Temple's special christmas tree show. A very loud, crowded, and uninteresting bunch of trees it was.

Back at home, Carrie started a fire in our wood burning stove with a chimney we'd just recently gotten cleaned, only to have all the smoke pour into the house.

How was your weekend?

Keith of the North

My high tolerance for the cold was noted even before I moved to Arizona. One roommate in Massachusetts called me Keith of the North.


Not long after my move to the desert, the Holt decided to take photos for the yearly calendar. At my suggestion a number of us headed up north to get some pictures of us as elves in the snowy forest. In the first pic you see me as an elf with big ears and no glasses.


Afterward as we were loading ourselves back into the cars and getting ready to head back home, a Native American came over to me to ask for money. I tend not to give beggars cash (though I have been known to give them food.) Carrie knew this, and stepped between us to say she was the one who handled the money. The guy then looks at me, me, who talks to animals, me, who juggles knives, me, who wanders around in the snow wearing a loincloth, and says "You wouldn't make a very good Indian."

As always, click on a pic to enlarge.

christmas presence

Carrie's brother Ross came out to visit us from Arizona and we all went outside to play in the snow. Ross and Pandora had the most fun. She is normally shy around strangers, but must be able to sense kinship because she has always been happy to see Ross and my sister, Kemmer.

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I got the newest in the series of the hardcover reprints of the T.H.U.N.D.E.R. Agents comics as well as a couple of Avengers (the TV series) books. Also a couple of Hong Kong action movie DVDs. The present I'm playing with most, though, is my new 1 terabyte external hard drive. I'm going to use it to store all my photos and artwork scans. I've already put more than 12,000 photos on it and that is just a drop in the bucket of its capacity.

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Today we're having a blizzard. I got out the snowblower and cleared enough to get my car out, then Carrie took over while I got ready for work. Just before leaving, though, I called in to work and found out the office is closed. Snow Day!

Typical Maine Weather

Last weekend was warm and sunny, shirtsleeve weather. This Saturday we wake up to find it snowing with three inches of accumulation already on the ground.

With no wind and lots of sheltering trees, there are areas you can see the grass that has already grown enough this year to need mowing right next to the covered trees.

Welcome to Maine.

Snow reason not to

Above is a view of our driveway heading out toward the road. Below is Pandora in the backyard. A couple days ago we were looking at a much greener landscape around here. With the rain and warmer temperatures the snow was all but gone. Suddenly, boom! Several inches of snow. Welcome to Maine.

I haven't shoveled or done any snowblowing yet because the temperatures are supposed to get into the 40s. If that happens and goes on for most of the day, it would be a waste of time to bother with snow removal. As the day wears on, I might have to do something, but for now...

Bizzy Winter

Looking out over our driveway toward the road.















I drive 45 minutes each way to work, work an 8 hour day with another hour in there for lunch, then usually work at least an hour of overtime. With the days getting longer I'm now seeing daylight in the morning, but the drive home is still in the dark. And Carrie has a longer drive and a lot more overtime than I do. In other words, we don't have a lot of free time these days. When we do, we're often doing needed errands or chores.












We had a bit of snow during the first part of the winter. Carrie has even done a few turns at the snow blowing. But it was up to me to shovel off the roof. I hadn't been keeping up with clearing the edges with our roof rake, so an ice dam was starting to build up. We weren't certain how much the next precipitation, a rain storm, would wash away the ice or add to it, so I had to get up there with the shovel. Fortunately, that was all that was needed to ensure the rest got melted in the rain.







Inside, with no photos to post just yet, we've got a lot of shelves up in the studio and all my comics are now accessible. I just have to put them in order.

The main part of the house is starting to feel like it's actually ours now that we've been putting out our bric-a-brac and hung a few things on the walls.

Snow Curl

With the wind blowing fiercely and the cold snow coming down, we ended up with this interesting bit of frosty gingerbread on our house.





First view from the door onto the lower level of the deck.










Second view from the studio's bathroom window.








While we're looking around the studio, here's the view onto the upper deck. We're pretty snowed in up here!

To enlarge any photo, just click on the magic snowflake hidden in the image.