Tomorrow will be my 21st day as a retired person.  In the first week, I left my property just once and that was only because I had a dentist appointment.  I ran a couple errands then returned home to continue my hermitting for as long as possible.  As of today, I've made 4 more excursions into the "world", which seemed quite adequate.  After the first week, I no longer felt like I was "hiding out" but for a little bit, it was enjoyable to not have to deal with people except by choice. After 29 years as a social worker, being a recluse for a while is actually pretty intriguing.

Odd as it seems, given my profession, I am an introvert. The past three weeks I have nurtured my introvert nature, enjoying being alone except for the dogs. I would say I was working on things I enjoy but interestingly, I have been cleaning house, not something that typically amuses me. Despite that, I have found considerable enjoyment in dusting, waxing, washing, sorting, rearranging and even discarding the accumulated goods of over half a lifetime.

People don't "become" introverts, they either are or they aren't. Knowing and understanding this to be a part of one's personality is, however, not inherent. When I was young, I was called shy because that is probably what my behavior looked like when I met new people, especially in groups. As a teen and young adult, I thought of myself as "shy" because I had heard it and because it seemed to explain why I was rarely at ease in a group of people and why my idea of a college "party" was sitting around with a few friends, drinking wine and philosophising about the state of the world. It was, after all, social work school. In those years, I sometimes told people I was shy only to be met with laughter and skepticism. Did this mean I wasn't shy?

Introvert, a new word for shy? When I first heard the term used, it was not in a very positive light. It seemed to refer to someone not only shy but rather "backward" and withdrawn, unable to function well in public. While I did not really consider this an accurate description of me, I certainly didn't fit the definition of an extrovert. It seemed to merit some research, so I gave it some. Then it all made sense. What I learned is that "introverts are drained by social encounters and energized by solitary, often creative pursuits. Their disposition is frequently misconstrued as shyness, social phobia or even avoidant personality disorder, but many introverts socialize easily; they just strongly prefer not to. In fact, the self-styled introvert can be more empathic and interpersonally connected than his or her outgoing counterparts." So, perhaps this explains why I could spend 29 years as a social worker yet revel in my days as a hermit.

A common preception, no doubt of extroverts, is that being alone is the same thing as being lonely.  As I searched for some art or photos to go with this blog, I searched "solitary people" "people alone" and other criteria I considered to mean "unaccompanied by another person".  Repeatedly, the pictures I found were titled "lonely" man, women or such.  These were sometimes pictures of people who appeared sad or distressed but just as often they appeared introspective, curious, peaceful or just deep in thought.  Other than the fact the pictures showed only one person, there was no clue to suggest the person was lonely.  I don't understand the assumption that these two words mean the same thing. I can always go visit someone but I rarely find myself feeling lonely although I am currently spending more than 90% of my waking hours in the company of only myself and my dogs.  Perhaps introverts deserve more respect, after all, not everyone can find pleasure in one's own company.

Very, VERY Unemployed!

That would be me.  Yaaaaaaawn!  Streeeetch"
How amazing! 

Even though I didn't actually lay around all day today, the FIRST day of my retirement,  the knowledge that I could if I WANTED to, was in itself awesome.  I did sleep in but only as long as the dogs would allow.  They insist on breakfast on some kind of schedule.  Scooter cannot stay in bed too late as her biscuit hunting instinct kicks in by 8:30 and there is no controlling her much past that time. 

Once breakfast was over, I raked the yard and cleaned the sidewalk from the porch.  Cleaned out the fishpond, hopefully the last time this year. Now I have to decide if the fish are coming in for the winter or if I'm going to get a heater for the pond.  It's not quite deep enough for over wintering the fish otherwise. 

The down side of the day was that Scooter was outside with me for a while and she went "shopping" in the yard. I think what she found was left behind by a neighborhood cat. YUCK!  She then had a partial relapse of her vestibular disorder and became fairly dizzy.  The combination was not good, she upchucked all over everything, including me.  She finally had to be force fed some meclazine for the dizziness and put in a crate for a couple hours until she stopped spinning.  Poor girl, still not feeling great and her head tilt is worse than usual but she stopped vomiting. 

Finally settled for the evening, now I'm going to have to take time out and do actual important stuff, meaning I have to read the stuff I got about my insurance so I am sure I have done what I need to.  I certainly don't want to mess up and find myself without any insurance at this point.  Guess I'll get the papers and get comfortable in the library as the dogs are now settled in front of the heater.  Don't want to disturb them and they can't just stay curled up, sleeping, if I leave the room. 

3-2-1- I'm GONE!

Yes, the countdown is that short. I have 3 more days to travel the 80 miles to the workplace. Part of Friday will be taken up with the retirement party. Monday, my last OFFICIAL day, I will go to the office only 35 miles from me and pack up the last stuff in my office there.
WOW! That close! A week from now, I will be sleeping in and when I get up, I will have a leisurely breakfast, with my dogs and watch some TV and contemplate what I would like to do for the rest of my life.

Not to worry, I already have a two page list of projects and I have barely scratched the surface. I think I want to construct that 2/3 size carousel horse that I bought wood for 20 years ago. That wood may be seriously hardened by now but I've got the tools to conquer it.

I am going to landscape my yard in the next couple years. I want to use a scene like this for my inspiration. I would love to bring in big red rocks and arrange them to create a natural looking landscape with native plants growing among the rocks. I want to design and build a window seat in front of my south dining room window so I can sit there in the sunshine, with a book, on cold, snowy winter days. I think I might have been a cat in a previous life, I so enjoy basking in the sun in the winter. Summer, not so much, I don't find nearly as much enjoyment in summer sunshine.

I still find it hard to imagine really being retired. I find myself thinking how on a coming weekend I want to make a trip to Menards to get more building supplies then I remember, I don't have to wait for the weekend. I can go ANY DAY I WANT TO! Now, how can I NOT be excited about that. Darn, better go add to my list, thought of some more things I want to do. LOL

JOBLESS! JOBLESS! Almost!

I got the word today, I'M APPROVED TO RETIRE! The deadline was extended so I will work to the end of October, time to finish up everything and pack up offices. All the changes over the past couple months are piling up and it is definitely time to go. New rules, new policies, new paperwork, increased duties, less staff. All this does not add up to improved working conditions.



Now the "West" Region of SRS takes in most of the state (the grey area) and we are taking bets on the likelihood one of the Florida imports to SRS, brought in by the new secretary that Brownback brought in from Florida, will end up running all of it from Emporia. Emporia, by the way, where I was born, is so far from western Kansas, it is not even in the middle! That last little county, sticking out on the east side of the grey area, is where Emporia is located.



carving



I was amazed at how happy and relieved I felt when I found out I was approved. The thought of staying home, working on my own house, my craft projects, my art and my family, including the dogs, has really grown on me since I first decided I was going to take the retirement option. Sadly, I won't see much of the people from the office since I've been working 35-80 miles away from my home for about 8 years now. That means it won't be real easy to drop in and say hi to those I used to work with. I'll miss seeing all of the coworkers I've spent years with but not enough to make me want to keep working.

LOSING MY MIND HERE!

OK, so I debated on retiring. I decided I was going to go for it, it made sense. I'm ready to stay home and put new floors in the house, visit grandkids more often, play with my dogs, do more art, more scrapbooking, and other things that I like to do. I sent in my notorized form to sign up for the retirement incentive program that came up.

After making the decision, I was excited, thinking about things I want to do. THEN I find out they are going to wait until after Labor Day to tell us who gets approved. That means that when I finally get notice, if I am approved, I have only 8 more days in the office to clear up anything that is still hanging. I have worked out of 2 offices the past 4+ years so I also have 2 offices to clean out.

If I thought banging my head on the desk would help, I'd do it till I was cross-eyed but after years working for the government, I know EXACTLY how much good it would do. OMG! I don't even know what else to say. For me that is a statement in itself. NO! NO! NO!

LONG, HOT summer!

Guess what! The guy who was going to give me an estimate for putting in a new furnace AND AIR CONDITIONER did not come back in the spring so the simmer (pun intended) has been pretty harsh with just window units running. I don't think the inside temperature has hit 90 but it has been uncomfortably close a few times. The bedroom and dog room is cooled by a window unit so sleeping is cool. Doesn't improve my desire to get up in the morning though. If the dogs would be quiet and I didn't have work, I'd sleep in every morning, just for the cool.

Now, on the subject of getting up for work, there is a possible retirement plan on the horizon. The new governor is driven to cut, cut, cut and as a result, there are offices being closed and now they have offered an early retirement package. Although it is not technically "early" retirement for me, since I am eligible for my pension plan, I was planning to work until eligible for social security. If I get this package, I will have insurance until I am eligible so I could stop working now. This idea is sounding rather fascinating because things have been changing dramatically in my job in the past couple months. These changes and the ones rumored to be coming, are making the job much more stressful and frustrating. I'm feeling like being retired could be a pleasant and relaxing change.

On a lighter note, the house has paint all the way around, although the back needs a second coat. July has been entirely too hot to work on it so that second coat has been pending for quite some time now. Retirement could give me that much needed time to work on this and all the other projects I want to complete. I'll have more time to spend with the dogs as well, which will be good for them as they need more training time than I have for them. I'm actually pretty excited about the prospect.

Pretty Posts

Tradition is to use trim colors on turned porch posts on a Folk Victorian house. The problem is, there are no instructions on how to paint them. I couldn't find more than a couple pictures of painted posts, none close to the shape of mine.

How much is too much? Not enough? How do you know when you get it right? I guess it is just done to taste, or maybe you stop when you get tired of painting little colored stripes around the posts. It ended up taking almost 2 weeks to get the posts done, mostly because I would paint a section, take a picture, then paint another section, trying to figure out just how much color I wanted on them. Of course, after figuring it out, I had to do 4 more posts, just the same. The reward is, my porch is starting to look really good.

With the long weekend, maybe I will start putting the ceiling on the porch. It would change the look tremendously as the open rafters are unfinished. I would have left the rafters exposed and painted but whoever built the porch did a very unsightly job of attaching it to the house. Not something that can be repaired without tearing the porch roof clear off so putting a new ceiling up seems to be the best alternative.

Metamorphosis

The transformation is nearly complete! Four years ago, my little house had grown quite sad in appearance. In 1985, I moved into my cheap little house, bought at auction for only $17.5K . By 2008, the paint had faded and peeled, the masonite siding had swollen in places, warped in others. It was just ugly, the only good looking part was the roof, which I had replaced a few years earlier. I decided it was time to make some improvements. Initially, the plan was just for some painting and siding, it turned into a major makeover.
The outcome pleases me! I love how my house looks now that it has new paint, siding, windows and a door. It is definitely unique in the little town I live in. With the new turned posts and colorful gingerbread trim, the addition of the porch brackets will finish off the ornate look popular in the original folk Victorian style home.

There are many things yet to be done. My deck in back will have proper legs put under it as I didn't want it attached to the house again and it will have a new roof put on it. The porch ceiling needs to be installed and painted. It will be ther rust color from the trim, as will the front door. The soffitts will also be replaced as poor material was used on them previously. I would like to re-face the porch steps as well. Of course, the rest of the house needs painted, only the front is done so far. I'm really proud of how far I've come and look forward to finishing the rest of the details.

Happy Mother's Day to myself!

Yes, I LOVE these new porch posts. How much better gift could I get for Mother's Day than having my siding and porch posts done? I don't know if this house really had a porch before it was added to back in 1975. That was before I lived in Norton so I don't know what it was like. I did find a picture of a house that was very similar to mine when they were built. It was one of the pictures I found when I started researching my house.



I discovered my house is "Folk Victorian" style, even though it was built a couple decades after that style was popular. FV let the middle class have some of the fancy details in their homes that wealthier people enjoyed on their Victorian and Queen Anne style homes.


The little house with purple and blue trim has a pair of doors on the small wooden porch. The one to the side as one walks onto the porch, is in the same location as the tall, thin window in my library. While working on that window, I discovered there had originally been a door there.


Overall, I am quite pleased with how the house is coming along. The addition of a 4th post across the front of the porch gave a more balanced look and the turned posts lend that extra
touch of vintage to the look.


Tomorrow is dedicated to doing some painting. I will be going over all the gold trim with better quality paint and painting the window and door trim with the same gold color. Guess I will be up the ladder again this summer. No worry, it is all downhill from here as far as my workload goes.

COLOR!! Color! color?

Much of the siding is on the house already. A couple more days and it should be done. The contractor will then install my patio door in back and possibly the porch posts. Although I was originally planning to do all these tasks, the idea of getting this part of it done is very appealing. I will still have all the painting to do and cutting the rest of the porch brackets, all the landscaping and years of inside projects so it isn't like I HAVE to do all of it.

It has been rewarding to do as much as I have on my own. I cherish my independence and my ability to do almost anything I set my mind to. When I hire someone to do something, I want it to be because I CHOOSE not to do it myself, not because I am unable to do it. Of course there are things I choose not to do because I don't want to try them. I have no urge to try snake charming, skydiving or bull riding or things that might seriously damage me.

As I have grown older, I recognized my own unwillingness to suffer pain when not necessary. Granted, climbing up and down ladders all day, lifting boards over my head, dropping boards on my face and hammers on my toes causes pain but that is somewhat necessary. Well, maybe not the dropping stuff on me part.

Philosophical stuff aside, now I really get to pick a color for my house. I have brought home dozens of paint cards over the past 3 years. Getting the right colors for the gables took at least 5 complete color schemes before settling on what I liked best. Since then I have picked many color swatches for siding. I've photo-shopped multiple colors onto pictures of my house, hoping to figure out what I wanted. I did eliminate the idea of the rust/red color and blue just didn't appeal to me for my house. This left me with variations on the yellow/gold tones. It is truly amazing how subtle the variations in colors can be, yet make so much difference. Too much pink in the tan, too much gray in the cream, too much blue in the yellow. Finally, I think I have found the right shade for my siding. It is called "Venetian Stucco" and it is very close to the same hue as the trim on the house but in a much lighter shade. It is hard to tell now if it will be too yellow for my taste but hopefully it will match beautifully and make my house a true gem in the neighborhood.

OH! OH!! OH!!!

This is just so exciting! Actual siding on my house! I LOVE IT!

This being the 4th spring in the siding project, it is about time. It is impressive. I go outside several times a day just to be able to look at the front of the house. I drove by it twice today and even walked across the street to talk to the neighbor so I could look at it from over there. OK, a little OCD maybe but I am very pleased to have this step underway.


An electrician came today to look at the meter and some wiring so he will do some work next week. Another man came to check the furnace and cut the old central air unit off the house. The CA hasn't worked for the past 3 summers anyway so now they don't have to side around the connections. When the siding is done, he will put in a new furnace and central air, much more efficient, since the old ones are 36 years old.

I will start installing the porch posts tomorrow I hope. It may be raining but unless the wind is blowing, I should be able to go ahead with this. I only have two of the decorative brackets cut so will be doing more scroll saw work. I have to do some research on this trim as I'm not sure if every post should have them or only the corner posts.

FINALLY.........

WORKERS HAVE ARRIVED!




Only a couple days late, which isn't too bad given that around here it seems to be very hard to get contractors to appear. They brought in the trailers today and marked their territory. (Guy thing?) Then they set up a neat tripod with a spinning lasar on the top which had to do with determining level. I WANT ONE! They didn't need to look for bubbles, a little beep tone increased in speed as level was neared and became a steady tone when they had it. No more twisting 6 ways to see that stupid bubble.


When that was done, they started doing the corners of the house. The corners of the house are wrapped with 1 x 4s made of cement composite material. They will start at 7 AM tomorrow so I have to be up early to get the dogs out and back in before they arrive. There is nothing like having a house full of little terriers and having work crews at the house.

Triki has been standing in my flowerpots in the south window because she can see the men walking around the yard. Plants that I have babied through the winter, barely kept alive, now the dogs are stomping on them while barking at the scary intruders in their yard. Hopefully they will adjust quickly.

OMG! Unbelievable!

Someone finally called me about doing the siding on my house. It has only been since last August that I made calls to find someone and at least a couple said they could do it but no one ever showed up. Just when I was starting to prepare for spring, figuring I would start putting up the siding as soon as the weather leveled out, a guy calls to say he wanted to look at the back part of the house. He came over the next evening and looked then came back the next to give me an estimate, which I considered very reasonable.

I am on their schedule for next week so will be taking most of the week off. The dogs have to be managed throughout the construction. The gates will be opened by people who don't know how fast a little Rat Terrier can be so no one will be able to go out of the house unless I am with them. I am pretty excited about getting this done, especially this early in the season so I will have time to do the painting during the summer then I can start some of the landscaping.

Tomorrow will be dedicated to clearing the rest of the stuff off the front porch. This includes the stacks of trim wood and porch ceiling boards. I need everything clean for the siders so they don't have to work around lumber, porch chairs and windchimes. After spending the winter in plastic wrap, I'm ready for some solid siding that I can slap some paint on. Oh no! Now I will have to choose a color for the house. Although I think I have it worked out, you would be amazed at how many shades of pale yellow-tan-cream there are. At least I gave up on red and blue.

Vacation??

Yes, I took a vacation. I took this entire week off because I have excess hours that need to be used. Since I have no specific plans, the supervisor suggested this week because no one else was wanting time off. Pretty typically, the weather conspired against me to make it impossible to get any work done on the outside of the house. The last 5 days have been overcast, foggy, drizzly, snowy, anything but warm and sunny.

I have continued to work on inside projects during the first part of this week. A week ago I picked up a load of salvage trim from a neighboring county. It included a number of pieces of ribbed, 5 inch wide yellow pine, some smooth 5 inch pieces, several window caps and "rosettes" for the top corners of windows. I considered this a pretty good find, free for the taking.

I used part of this wood to trim out the library window. The cap was just beautiful, with some sanding and a wire brush on the decorative molding then some poly stain to seal and it looked good. I have yet to seal the side trim and sill but will add a board below the sill first, as is the style with the old wide trims. I'm hoping it will all take the stain fairly evenly as the color on the top is very pleasing and I'd like to avoid painting this trim. The wood grain is very nice if left exposed.


Someone asked me the other day what I would do when I got done with the house. I assured them this would not be a problem as I have enough projects to last until I die. So, I guess as long as I am able to lift a hammer, I will be modifying my house. I suppose I could hire someone to finish up the renovation but then in my old age, all I would have to do is lay around watching TV and eating bonbons. NOT a good idea!

Got-r done!

The house now has a plywood shell(well, mostly) and is wrapped in plastic. Just in time, 8-10 inches of snow arrived yesterday and having a plastic coating should discourage that blowing in between the boards. I even managed to finish it without any additional injuries or disasters.

The new door is yet to be installed but that will probably have to wait until I can count on the temperature not dropping below zero, mid- job. Nothing like a 5 foot wide hole in the wall when it starts snowing. The new door, which is not actually new, still needs a little work before installation. It is a recycled door and needed some cosmetic work when I bought it.

I removed the moulding that held the glass in place and scraped away all the old glazing compound. I have reglazed and replaced the moulding on most of it but still a little to do then it all needs a good painting. I also need to divise a system to protect it from little dog paws that like to pat, pat all over the door when they are sent out to play. I haven't figured out how I'm going to do that yet. Perhaps utilizing the screen door off the old patio door?

Well, at least there are hints that spring will be here soon, so I may be able to make faster progress before long. Today there was no chance for working outside. The snow is settling but there is still a good 6" over the yard, except where I shoveled out "potty" areas for the dogs. They just refuse to wade out in that snow to take care of their business. Of course their bellies were dragging in the snow so I guess I can't blame them.

The House Fights Back!

Weather in Kansas, being what it is, did the unexpected again today and turned out a 53 degree day. Just 3 days ago windchill temperature was around -35. Tomorrow is expected to be cold again although only around freezing. Two weeks in a row now, Saturday has turned out to be very pleasant, which has allowed me some time to work outside on the house. Today, my hope was to finish the plywood sheathing on the back of the house. I am working on the gable presently and was able to complete half of it last week, even with the unfortunate fall of the electric meter. Turned into an 8 hour day out there, interrupted only by a water break and by coming in to lie on the floor and scream after dropping a 25 pound sheet of plywood, on edge, onto my face. Now that HURT! After the fact, I actually considered myself quite lucky. The 3/4" board came down on my upturned face and hit just below my nose on that inch of flesh above my lip. Had it been slightly higher, it would have broken my nose and possibly my glasses. Had it hit slightly lower, I would probably have lost teeth. As it is, I have only an abrasion across the space between my nose and upper lip and considerable swelling. I was not knocked out but I now understand the term "punch drunk" as I had a few minutes where I felt pretty out of it. This is the reason for the lying on the floor. I thought it preferable to falling to the floor. As for the screaming, which included some profanity, I heard a while back that cursing can actually help with pain. At that point I was willing to try it. I'm feeling rather beat up tonight, I think I could safely say I have a headache. While watching TV I could feel my entire head pulsing. I'm thinking I might haul out that leftover pain med from my surgery and see if it improves my night. I don't use pain killers stronger than Tylenol very often and I don't think I've ever finished off the stuff doctors have given me after surgery. In this case, however, I think I will make an exception.

Renovation reality......nightmares!

OK, my project has officially become a reality show episode. Just when I thought things were coming along reasonably well, despite the fact I was working outside under halogen lights until 9 PM the last 2 nights. Friday night was great but Saturday was getting pretty cold by then but I had open holes in my attic gable which had to be closed in before bad weather arrives.


Saturday, having turned out nicer than expected, looked like a good time to get a bit more plywood on the house. Standing near the top of the 16 foot ladder, ripping down fiberboard was fine, then I decided to remove the last piece of masonite siding, at the top of the gable. I sliced through the plank as it had a large screw eye in it which the electric wire from the pole attached to.

Unfortunatly, a small miscalculation occurred about this time. The screw eye, which I thought had been screwed into the 2x4 running up the wall behind the electric box, was actually only screwed into fiberboard. When the last piece of siding was cut, the electric meter and the 10 foot steel pipe running from it to the roofline, had no support at all and the next thing I knew, the electric wires were on the ground and the meter was hanging from side of the house.

Nice, eh? Ever wonder what you should do when your electric meter falls off your house? Not really something I spent a lot of time contemplating up to this point. Forced to think about it, the first thing that came to mind was "Is it safe to touch it?" followed by wondering if I would end up with a pile of crispy critters if the little dogs ran into it. I decided first priority was to herd the dogs into the house and lock them in. Then I debated what to do next while continuing to pull sheathing off the house. I thought about calling for someone to come cut the power off but had visions of spending the rest of the weekend in a dark, cold house. I thought about just leaving it laying in the yard until Monday when utility workers would be on duty. I was so flummoxed! What to do?


Fortunately, about that time a neighbor drove up and having been a friend of my son during childhood, he commented on how much fun it looked like I was having. His brother works for the city so he called to see if it was safe to leave the meter down over the weekend. The brother didn't think this would be safe so he called a crew who showed up shortly and cut the meter loose from the pole. They then rehung the meter on the house and connected the wires back up so I didn't have to spend Sunday in the dark. I didn't get the plywood all up but that will have to wait for another weekend.

Winter construction......

NOT such a good idea! It hasn't exactly been WARM but over the past 2 weeks it has been above freezing a few times so plywood has been going up. Sadly, today was beautiful as are the next 3 weekdays predicted to be but of course dark arrives at my house before I do on work days. Am I likely to be taking any time off this week to work on finishing up the plywood? Not a chance.

Not to worry, Saturday and Sunday I get to stay home but then temperatures are predicted to return to around freezing for the weekend. Top that with the fact that the worst part of the installation is yet to come, the upper part. Given that a sheet of 3/4" CDX plywood weighs around 75 lbs and the gable of the house starts 8' above ground, this promises to be a formidable task. There may be more cutting on the upper

level as a 32" wide piece will weigh significantly less than a 48" wide piece.

The biggest challenge is over, the sheathing behind the electric meter went in last Saturday. It took cutting a keyhole (?) slot to slip over the wiring where it enters the electrical box but that was the most worrysome part of this process. There will be another hurdle at the top where the wire comes to the house but it won't require cutting around, just sliding the plywood under the pole.

Now, if I can just manage to haul the new patio door from the garage to the back of the house, real progress will be happening.

BRRRRRR.........

I think it is official now, winter is here. No one showed up in early December to put siding on the house so there stands the bare house, wrapped on three sides with white plastic. The back, uncovered, waits for me to have time off on warm days so the black fiberboard can be replaced with plywood.

The deck frame now stands independent of the house, resting on blocks, all the decking boards removed and stacked on the plywood sheathing. I think this tactic worked to flatten some of the warp that was in the plywood when I bought it. Apparently, even in large stacks, CDX plywood can warp the long way.

Now, if we could just get some sunny weekends with temperatures at least in the upper 30's, perhaps I could start putting up the plywood. Yesterday was beautiful, the sun was shining and it was in the 40's but of course that was a workday. Tomorrow is predicted to be overcast

and close to freezing all day. NICE! On the other hand, compared to last weekend, it is

pretty comfortable. It was -15 last weekend and

with wind chill was more like -25 during the
night. Needless to say, it would have been nice to have siding on the house.

The snow came last weekend, too. It made quite a mess but did get me a day off work. In fact, the office closed because of it and that is quite an event. On Tuesday however, which I had taken off to attend to personal stuff, I had to stomp through the snow to the dentist then to get my driver's license renewed. Following that, I had to dig out the truck so I could drive to the next appointments. By the end of the day, I'd had my fill of snow for the year.