More Weather Travails

I'm getting kind of tired of the weather ALWAYS being a "good news/bad news" scenario.

The good news: The weekend was gorgeous with very little rain and SPRING-LIKE temperatures (as opposed to the mid and upper 90s of last week and the week before that). That was extra good news for me because I was on the move most of the weekend with a birthday party on Saturday (with shopping for household stuff and washing a car piled on) and a bridal shower on Sunday.

The better news: We get to keep our spring weather for most of this week.

The bad news: It's supposed to rain every day this week (except maybe Friday) and at least through Wednesday we have the threat of severe weather. Really? Hasn't there been quite enough already, thanuveryfreakinmuch?! Mother Nature just needs to back off for a while. She's been waaaaaay too moody this year already -- and there's still another half of a year left!

Pea Soup

I tried to capture some lightning shots last night. We had one of those wonderful light shows that comes with only a few drops of rain, but a burst of lightning in every piece of the sky.

So I tried to capture lightning with the new camera for the first time. I didn't do so hot. I might share one or two of the more ominous-looking ones later.

However, the pea soup that has enveloped our area today, can be captured quite nicely. I shot these while I was waiting for the bus at the main depot.

In the shot above there is a car coming down that street! Can you see it? I couldn't while I was taking the shot. I only noticed it after the camera was away from my face and the car was rolling through the stop sign.

It really was kind of spooky. Like something out of a John Carpenter movie or a Stephen King novel. This was the view RIGHT IN FRONT OF ME. And that space off to the left. That's where the buses pull up. You could see NOTHING there. Not that I could tell. Luckily, there was at least some light outside or this could have been a whole lot worse. Of course, I did drive across town in it. It doesn't creep me out the way it does the mother. More than the scary, I tend to think more of the last part of Gone With the Wind where Scarlett is running home through the fog to Rhett from the Wilkes’ house. The fog which is both a literal and metaphorical symbol of her love for Ashley. (Yeah, I skew to the hopeless romantic side. God help me.)

Even so, standing in the middle of an area that is somewhat desolate to begin with at 7 a.m. when it’s not all that light out yet, can have just a bit of an edge to it.

Springtime? Really?

Yesterday, it was almost 60 degrees and sunny. It didn’t start out that way, but as the morning progressed, it turned into an awesome day. I only got to enjoy it on the way home.

So, of course, it’s raining today. And now that the grass is turning green and the trees and flowers are blooming, it’s going to snow. Yep. I said s-n-o-w. (A four-letter word with good reason.)

The rain will mix with snow later today and then change to all snow overnight. They’re saying 2-4 now, but that it could be 4-6, and if the “thundersnow” happens, well … we don’t even want to talk about it.

The last time I heard a forecast for 2-4 inches of snow and we were hit with thundersnow … it was January 1982. We ended up getting more than a foot and it shut St. Louis down for days.

The mother and I are preparing to head out in a bit and grab some stuff so that going anywhere tomorrow isn’t necessary. I imagine we’ll have lots of company in our travels.

I feel real bad for my young colleague that we had the bridal shower for earlier this month. She’s getting married this afternoon. Maybe it will hold off long enough for folks to get through dinner at her reception. I hope that everyone stays safe and that it all goes well.

That’s the thing about life in this part of the country. No matter what time of year you plan something, there is always that change for some kind of weather anomaly.

So, off we go. But the best part is that when we come back, we’ll have Chinese food!

Ice Cold

Another busy day and another day where I’ve managed to lose something. Yes, another set of ear warmers! Can you believe it? Not the ones I just got, but still, fairly new.

I’m hoping they’re just laying around my office someplace. One thing is certain: I had them on when I arrived this morning. I know this because it was TEN FREAKIN’ DEGREES with a wind chill factor of -5 No one gave us a warning on this stuff. It’s only going to get into the 20s again tomorrow, and it was supposed to be 50-something. Now we’re talking half that.

So, here’s hoping I locate them in the morning.

Speaking of weather … well, why not? I’ve done little else most of the day! I’ve been talking to and emailing with reporters most of the day, in parts of the country hit by the ice storm last week, some of whom just got power back themselves. I was even able to commiserate with them, to a point. Our massive power outage was in the summer. Granted, 100-degree weather, but summer – not this crapola!

And speaking of being cold…this is giving something I bought for the house over the weekend a true work-out. If it is still performing well, I’ll definitely be buying more. Expect a review tomorrow.

The Winter Cottage

Isn't that what it kind of looks like?I shot this while I was waiting for the bus this morning. When I was reviewing the handful of shots I took, that’s how it struck me: a little winter cottage! It was before first light, so it's pretty dark but I think that adds to the winter feel.

It’s supposed to start warming up tomorrow. I’ll believe it when it happens.

It was flurrying this morning and the wind was blowing around a good deal of snow off rooftops and off ungaraged cars where the drivers didn’t bother to push it off. So the snow action is almost as rampant here as in the ones I shot last night. And doesn’t the road look really different from the Tuesday morning shot? You could actually see a road on Tuesday. Not so this morning.

Remember when I said my feet were soaked? Well, here’s why.
As I walked from the porch to the street, the snow was pushing up under my pant legs and jamming into my boots. The process repeated once I reached the sidewalk on the other side. That's where I grabbed this shot. See how deep my prints are?! That's because of not only all the snow we got, but because the snow plow has buried the sidewalks.

Luckily, I remembered to pack a pair of shoes and some dry socks.

When I get home, I'll just go through the same thing all over again in reverse. Unless the snow fairy cleared my drive and walkway ...

The Antithesis of a Snow Day

My feet are soaking wet from standing calf-high in snow. It’s still flurrying a little, but the snow itself stopped a few hours ago. I’m guessing that we got somewhere between 6-7 inches, maybe a little more, including the sleet from Monday night and yesterday. If it was still snowing, I would be firmly planted in the livingroom. But it’s not, and the buses are running, and pretty close to on time! That doesn’t leave me much in the way of an excuse to stay inside.

Even so, getting across and then down the street was a bee-otch to say the least. I nearly fell twice but with the mother watching from the window, I knew I’d never hear the end of it if I did.

Unlike yesterday morning when most of the main arteries were clear or a little slushy, today they are totally snow-packed. The road crews were at it all night but it didn’t do them much good. The snow was coming down hard, starting right around the evening rush hour.

The trip home was treacherous, but our brave driver Linda kept her head. She got us through a few miles where I know it was pretty hard to see. And, on roadways where it looked like after the morning rush, everyone had just gone home and let Mother Nature have her way with them until evening.

I’m not sure what my most excellent friend the Monkeygirl’s plans are for today, but I think she is onto something here. Maybe if enough of us get on board, we can push this through.

Clearly, with my love of snow, I’m all for it!

It Looks Pretty

Yeah, it looks pretty, but I still hate it. Snow belongs on Christmas cards and at ski resorts.

I am a sole passenger on the bus so far. Looks like some of my fellow commuters either got an earlier start or just stayed home.

Most of the local school districts cancelled classes today. It’s not really that bad. We ended up getting about a half-inch of sleet followed by an inch or two of snow. Just enough to make the roads sloppy and slick and not enough to scare people into slowing down. Sounds like a fairly lethal combo to me as the temperature is in the teens and we aren't getting above 20 today.

What’s impressive is that my roadway, and so far, most of the ones through town, are quite clear. That's a view from my door. You can actually see the roadway.

I saw on the news earlier, many of the highways and thoroughfares both south of here and on the other side of the river remain snow-packed. Kudos to our street department guys, even though the snow plow kept me awake off and on through the night.

The snow isn’t done yet, though. They’re saying it’s going to start up again pretty soon and won’t taper off until this evening. Luckily, I made it from the office to the bus stop before the sleet kicked in last night. The roads were icing up along the way, but since I get let off out front, I only had to navigate from sidewalk to front door so it wasn’t too bad.



I don’t think I’ll be so lucky tonight. I think there will be plenty of snow to slog through by then. I just wish it was sand.

Perfect Weather!

Yes, the 1 or 2 degrees it is right now with a wind chill of about -15, is perfect weather -- if you are Santa Claus, a polar bear or an Eskimo.

Being none of the above, I'm finding it to be less than optimal. Instead, I feel like the little brother in A Christmas Story. You know, the kid who couldn't put his arms down ... I'm one of those people who don't care how stupid it looks. Is it warm? That's all I care about on days like today.

A whole bunch of school districts canceled classes today. Didn't even see a school bus all the way in. All I could think last night when I saw the closed districts scrolling at the bottom of the TV screen was: Can they cancel work? Pleeeeeeeeeeeaaaaaazzzzz!

I guess I should look on the bright side. there are other places that are colder. Like Chicago. North Dakota. Much of the northeast.

Yeah. I'll find some comfort in the fact that it's going to warm up soon. After all the sun is out, so that's going to help, right?

Not so much. It IS going to warm up. In fact, tomorrow I'm thinking short sleeves might be in order since we'll actually go above 20. But today? It's going to warm up to -- now get ready for this one --

8.

Not Fit For Man Nor Beast

THE NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE IN ST LOUIS HAS ISSUED A WIND CHILLADVISORY...WHICH IS IN EFFECT FROM MIDNIGHT TONIGHT TO 12 PM CSTTHURSDAY. AN ARCTIC AIR MASS WILL PLUNGE INTO MISSOURI AND ILLINOIS LATERTODAY. TEMPERATURES TONIGHT WILL DROP TO BETWEEN 5 BELOW ZERO AND 5 ABOVE ZERO AND GUSTY NORTHWEST WINDS OF 15 TO 25 MPH CAN BE EXPECTED.


THE COMBINATION OF BITTERLY COLD AIR AND GUSTY NORTHWEST WINDS...WILL RESULT IN DANGEROUS WIND CHILL LEVELS FROM 15 TO 24BELOW ZERO UNTIL MIDDAY ON THURSDAY.


This is taken directly from an advisory issued this morning. I am SO not up to this.


I can give you a recommendation though. To replace my lost ear warmers, I checked out Kohl's.com because they didn't have them in the store. Guess what? SALE!!! Regularly $25, these little beauties are now $10 each. I could never find them in brown so this is marv. SCORE!

Is It Tuesday -- or Monday?

Mother Nature must’ve forgotten to flip her calendar –it isn’t even Monday. That is the strange part, I thought, as I carefully and very gingerly maneuvered into the yard, shying away from the sheen of ice that glazed my brick walkway this morning.

It took a few extra minutes to reach the sidewalk, remain standing on its icy surface, and then wait ‘til I could safely cross four iced-up lanes of roadway. It took so long that I had just reached my destination across the street as the bus turned the corner. Here’s hoping that that block between the bus stop and the office isn’t ice-covered.

The bus is unusually full this morning. There are at least 10-12 others aboard, about eight of whom got on before me. Highly unusual. Even after emptying at the central depot, we’ve picked up about as many as got off. My quiet little bus is becoming popular. UGH.

We don’t appear to be sliding much, which is good, but then the driver is going slowly and braking cautiously. (Update: we just did a crazy-ass slide but stayed on the road, as we passed a police scene where someone else wasn’t as lucky. Just looks like they crashed the curb and maybe a signpost though.)

Poor Ozzie. Sunday night, he made an awkward jump from the loveseat and appears to have injured one of his back legs or feet. Nothing seems swollen or tender to the touch. I think he just twisted something. (He did this a few years ago while charging down the basement stairs.) I saw a little improvement last night, (after a day of mostly staying off of it and of no jumping) so I’m not overly concerned, but we are still watching him.

The mother is babying him BIG time. He is eating this up, believe me. Sometimes, I know he’s smarter than we think he is. This would be one of those times. He’s going to milk it for all it’s worth. He is SO pitiful though. If he’s not any better by tomorrow, I guess he will have to go to the vet.

Cross your fingers that this isn’t the case.

Gone With the Wind

I’m awake only because there have been several times in the past hour that I’ve been certain that This D*mn House was coming apart at the seams. Sitting and watching The Weather Channel just did a good job of explaining why.

It’s a whopping 7 degrees. The wind is 28 mph with gusts at 42 mph. The wind chill? -12. OUCH! The projected high for today? All of 18. It could be worse. They just said the high for Chicago today would be FIVE!

On Friday afternoon, the cover to our fire pit blew away. Now, I’m afraid the fire pit itself might do the same, even though it’s weighted down with bricks. I keep peering out the windows to make sure that something we own doesn’t go scuttling down the street.

Between the wind rattling windows and beating wires against the house, and an occasional outburst from Toby the Cat, it’s been a very long night.

Keep your fingers crossed that it doesn’t tear any lines down or that we don’t lose anything else.

Delayed Decorating

Today’s scene is a lot different than yesterday’s, that’s for sure! Where it was ice, today it’s only rain as it’s about 10 degrees warmer already this morning. We’re going over 50 again today, but it’s supposed to rain on and off throughout the day, with temperatures plummeting between afternoon and evening.

Snow is on tap for tonight, though they say it’s not supposed to amount to much. I guess we’ll see. All I know is that if it doesn’t dry up any before it hits the low of 26 this evening, it’s going to be a skating rink again.

So that’s put a damper on outdoor decorating. I still need to get a smaller outdoor cord (I’m thinking 25 feet, like one I saw in this week’s Target ad) and I’ll need to get some of those clips, too, to see if I can tuck it up along the bottom of the siding as the mother doesn’t want it on the ground. That will get my two lighted trees hooked up on the porch.

While I unloaded the extra bricks we bought last weekend – so I could make squares in the two bare middle patches along the front to match the ones currently on either sides – they were frozen in yesterday’s adventures in ice and now they’re in small pools of water. Then, I need to unload the marble chip that will be placed in pots to keep those sorry ass Martha Stewart trees in place. Those won’t be lit. Then, those pots will go on those squares.

And then, there’s even something else to get lit up beneath the carport. But all that stuff is contingent on the weather. It has to dry out and warm up a little first. Luckily, that is supposed to happen later in the week – and I’m off on Friday!

The problem child then in this little misadventure are two wreaths. The mother wanted to light them with battery-pack lights. We have some tiny, tiny sets of which you’d need at least two for each wreath. We found some slightly bigger light packs for $1/set. Unfortunately, you get what you pay for.

Because they take two C batteries, the packs that energize them are heavier than hell. That’s going to make them really tough to attach to the wreath and the complicate getting the wreath to hang on the door. Not all the lights work. And, if you jiggle the poorly-constructed powerbox too much, none of them will work. Frustrating.

I guess I have to be a victim of Walgreens then and their prices, as that’s the only place I’ve seen the other tiny light sets (that take AA batteries) like we had before. At least I know those work and they’ll be lots easier to manage.

More Schizophrenic Weather

With the temperature at a balmy 52 degrees, it’s hard to imagine the slip-n-slide that was my driveway this morning. It’s long been said that if you don’t like St. Louis weather, hang around an hour or two – it’s bound to change. This is definitely a place where you can see all four seasons within the same day!

Luckily, the closer we got to St. Louis this morning, the better the road conditions got. This was due in part to the salt trucks that were out on the major roadways. In fact, as we crossed the bridge, I noticed the water beginning to puddle. That’s always a good sign. My walk to the office was a whole lot different than my penguin march from home to the bus stop!

There’s supposed to be more rain tonight, but luckily, warmer temperatures through tomorrow. So no ice. Maybe.

At least not until tomorrow night – when it may snow.

The Rain Stays Away

The forecast rain, short of a few showers very early this morning, never came. In fact, it was a pretty glorious day.

Before noon, I went outside and started working on the driveway. The first order of driveway sealing is to fill cracks. Apparently, I did a pretty good job four years ago as a lot of the patching I did then is still in place. (You can see much of it now as the sealer itself has worn away.)

It's tedious and time-consuming work. So, I didn't get all that far. I did get some of the deeper cracks cleaned out and filled. Not that far, but at least it's started.

My time in the driveway gave me a unique vantage point to the neighbors' open house. It ran for about four hours. There were three visitors during that time.

And boy, what a conscientious agent. *sarcasm* At 3:45, she was putting stuff in her car. She had taken down the open house sign, the balloons she'd brought, and was pulling out of the driveway by 4 p.m. Makes me want to go hire her right now.

I'm anxiously waiting to see if the forecast (dry weather all week) has changed. Cross your fingers. I need it to be dry as much this week as possible and ALL of next weekend. C'mon Mother Nature. Be nice.

Flooded Friday

It doesn't look quite this bad today, but it's not far off -- at least bad enough to keep me sitting still for a little while. And I guess I'd better get used to it. Seems like we're in for rain ALL weekend. Lovely.

I guess I shouldn't complain too much. I could always be in Galveston.

The thunder that awakened me about 4:45 brought heavy rain with it shortly thereafter. It POURED for about an hour, flooding my roadway and from what the news is showing, several streets between here and work. So I'm in no particular hurry to head out even though it's stopped now.

Between the thunder, Ozzie demanding to be let up because of it, Toby being woke up by it, and then the mother, I never went back to sleep. So I'm going on less than five hours. Not a pretty scene. Five is about my limit to function coherently. And joy of joys, I've got a really full plate today.

It should be a fun day. Happy Friday!

The Second Third - Part 2

I nearly did it: The second third is all but complete!

I had to stop to dig out much of the last third as if you don't, and work right to the edge of the current work zone, things get even messier and more complicated. I hate the digging. It's my least favorite part of the whole procedure.

I did get to go back and tack on three or four more rows to what I'd already done yesterday once I got to a good stopping point with the digging. I really did get a lot done.

It wasn't as humid as Saturday, but the sun was still hot so that slowed me a bit. As the sun began to drop and the walkway fell to shade, a nice breeze even kicked in, so that made the work go even better.

If Mother Nature will cooperate over the holiday weekend, this project will be done. I'm going to clean up my dancin' shoes as I fully intend to tapdance down the damn thing once it's finished.

How Ambitious Am I?

During our second year at This D*mn House, the old widow lady on one side (we were bounded by them when we moved in) moved into a nursing home and a funny old couple moved in. Mr. M. would ALWAYS greet me whenever he saw me working outside with, "My, you're ambitious!" And I would laugh and sometimes tell him, "No. Just stupid with a touch of crazy."

Sadly, the Ms have both long since died, but I feel a little of that sentiment today. It is GLORIOUS outside. Sunny. 70s. Light breeze. I just unloaded my latest brick purchase and am going uptown to grab a few items before I delve into my day. My day, which includes the following list: Empty and scour catboxes and associated tread pads. Mow lawn. Cut out monster root Dago left during fence removal. Take all clippings, plus two bags from Carole's weed adventures, to dump. Break up first and largest concrete slab in walkway. And finally, last, but certainly not least: FINISH THE FRIGGIN'PORCH.

I'm hearing Mr. M. about now ... Wish me luck!