Variable Weather

No matter where I have lived across the country, the weather has always been known to change wildly within a day or even hours.  Even though it is not so uncommon, it is worth mentioning when it does occur.  

Last week started out a bit on the cold side which was really average temperatures for this time of year.  Then, on Monday, we had a little bit of a snowstorm that dumped about eight inches of wet, heavy snow on us.  

I didn't bother trying to start the snowblower since we have not been leaving the house anyway but I did need to rake the roof and do some shoveling.  The snow was deep and it was heavy so it was a necessity to remove it from the roof.  I knew that it would only get heavier as it melted on the roof and eight inches of snow is a lot of snow.  

I wasn't too thrilled about needing to rake the roof so early in the season.  Even a healthy person wouldn't be too thrilled about needing to rake the roof but my spinal injuries take a big hit whenever I need to move snow and that always knocks me down for a few days.  The spinal pain I experience each day, even on a relatively good day, is always bordering at the edge of "just barely tolerable" but having to move snow puts the pain well beyond tolerable.  It usually requires about a week before the inflammation subsides to tolerable levels again.  To compound the problem, inflammation worsens my primary illness too by causing my mast cells to become even more active than their abnormally over-active selves.  Knowing this, as much as I love snow, I wasn't too thrilled about needing to start down this path again so early in the season but the roof needed to be cleaned off.

As the snow was flying...  and it was indeed flying and blowing...  I decided to grab one of my cameras to capture a few photos.  I have found that it is difficult to capture the severity of snow falling in still images though.  Still images are good for portraying the "peaceful, snow silently falling" environment but never really accurately depicts the brutality and severity of a snowstorm.   

I shot a photo (above) and, when I looked at the image on my LCD screen on the back of the camera, it looked like snow falling gently and silently from the sky.  Then I opened the window to look at what was really happening outside...  I was blasted by gusts of wind and cold wet snow blowing into the house.  The wind was buffeting the roof, the trees were blowing like tall grass in the wind and it sounded like a typical howling storm.  I decided to check the security cameras around the house to see if the video clips appeared more like what I was seeing from our living room window...

The video was captured in the morning when it first started snowing.  When the snow finally stopped later that evening, we had a good eight inches of snow piled up everywhere.  The following morning the temperature was still around 30° so I knew it would be a heavy, wet snow.  I could tell from inside the house that there was at least six to eight inches of snow outside and that amount of heavy wet snow means I need to remove it from our roof before we end up with a collapsed roof.  When I stepped out into the snow, I immediately realized that the snow was at least eight inches deep.  

The weather forecast was telling us that the temperatures would rise quickly so I knew I didn't need to bother with the snowblower.  The snow would be melted within a day or two and, during the pandemic, we haven't been moving the car out of the driveway more than once or twice a month.  Heavy, wet snow isn't good for a roof though so I had to tackle that at a minimum.  

I raked the roof and cleaned up a path to our door and my spinal injuries were screaming at me already.  I came back into the house, soaked and cold.  By Wednesday, the temperature was up nearing 80° and it stayed there through the following weekend!

Since it was sunny and warm the rest of the week, that allowed me to put away all our summer stuff and take out all our winter and Christmas stuff.  Sheila and I decided that this warm weekend was probably the ideal time to do whatever Christmas decorating we were going to do this year on the outside of the house.  

Ironically, because my health has been so lousy for the past ten months, I had been in no mood to waste any energy putting up Christmas decorations this year.  I thought I had already decided that I wasn't going to do any Christmas decorating this year.  I usually go overboard with Christmas decorating so my slightly premature decision to forego Christmas decorations this year is a significant indication of how lousy I have been feeling for the past ten months.  Well, the weather warmed up and I had a few decent health days so Sheila and I put up some outdoor Christmas decorations anyway.  So much for what I had previously planned to do this year.

While Sheila tended to a small burn pile (I had trimmed some trees and we had some other brush to burn), I used some of the boughs that I had just trimmed off one of our trees to make a nice, big, bushy Christmas wreath for our front door.  It turned out fairly nicely.  We still need another eight small Christmas wreaths for our windows but I wired every window for Christmas lights while the weather was ideal.  Once we can buy the remaining wreaths we need (Christmas wreaths aren't available just yet), then I just need to hang them and plug in some Christmas lights on each wreath.  So that last part of decorating is ready to go so I'd say it is mostly done too!  The most difficult part is already done anyway.

The following Wednesday was Veteran's Day and Sheila had the day off.  While we were on a roll with Christmas decorating, we decided to decorate the inside of the house too.  We don't usually decorate the inside of the house until Thanksgiving weekend but we made an exception this year since I was feeling up to it.  At this point, I was barely feeling up to it but we were on a roll so it seemed like the perfect time to make that final push.  Now the Christmas tree is up, decorated, and lit.  

Traditionally, Sheila and I have a little Thanksgiving get-together as well as two or three little Christmas get-togethers, however, we have no intentions to entertain for the holidays this year.  We've already had this deadly virus and we have no intentions of getting it again or being responsible for spreading it to family and friends.  I'm still struggling with recurring symptoms ten months later!  We decided it would be wiser to stay in quarantine and avoid the risk of spreading the virus.  It simply is not worth it.  

Fortunately, Sheila and I enjoy each other's company and are very happy and content spending all our time together!