Hello friends!
Let’s talk cold. Like -2 degrees cold. Because over the holiday weekends that’s where we ended up. I know we talk about the weather a lot here, but like, I lived in a place where it rained about 70% of the time and was always grey and overcast! You know why the bluest skies you’ve ever seen are in Seattle?! Because you get so used to the grey you can’t fathom another color! I’m sure it shocks no one that at one point my little heart considered studying meteorology, but really it is fascinating.
Or, in the case of -2 degrees where its normally not that cold: its terrifying. Sobering. Punched a big ole hole in my “we’re prepared” mindset.
For one main issue: it turns out my heating system stops working at about 20°. This is normally fine because while we regularly get down into the teens, it’s usually only for a few hours overnight. It’s a big problem when 11° is the high for the day. Its been ridiculously cold in the house. I’ve had two comforters on my bed and basically don’t go anywhere without some form of blanket. My little space heater has been working hard because most tech devices don’t appreciate the uncharacteristically cold temperatures either.
It also caused the heaters to my outdoor water supply to quit. Which means literally everything froze up and I had split hoses turning my property into a lovely ice rink the minute we got a little thaw going. Not ideal.
I finally snuck out to get some hay, i was kinda worried about it because we haven’t really had the flatbed out in the snow yet, and due to the temperatures and such neither county had bothered with plowing the roads. In their defense, its been scary cold and dumping lots of snow, plus this time last year they accidentally parked a plow in my neighbors field, which I’d imagine is quite the deterrent. It was very odd to walk into my room look out on a pretty white snow patch (I wasn’t completely over it last year like I am already this year) and just seeing one poor gentleman and my neighbors standing out staring at a plow sitting askew down an embankment into my neighbors field. I’d imagine that was a very scary ride.
Poor dad took a fall in the snow this year, which has not helped his love of the snow, but he’s doing okay now. Jammed his back for a while, the poor thing. He’s already fighting a bad back so I’m trying to help keep him off the slick stuff as much as possible.
The upside to cold temperatures is it’s made staying inside a little easier. I’m less tempted to spend a whole day puttering around outside, which works out since we’ve been crazy swamped at work the last few weeks. My boss made sure we all got lovely holiday weekends, which I am so grateful for, but we are in a highly time sensitive space so there’s always a million things to be done and we are now playing a little more catchup than I think we had realized. I’m simultaneously glad and a little bit regretful I didn’t take any extra PTO for the holidays, because I was able to keep most of my plates spinning, but also, I’m kinda missing the usual new year refreshed feeling.
But it’s also cool because for the first time ever in my actual career I might be able to take a few days off this summer. I always got magically called in on days off in previous roles (except for the last one, to be fair, I just wasn’t there long enough to try a vacation). My first “grown up” role I worked 365 days a year because my boss always forgot they needed something on the weekend or on the rare holiday and I didn’t meet the priority standards for using any time off. We were not in any sort of hurry either, so I never understood. Oh well, each chapter of life is a learning experience. Some lessons blow but whatever.
In any case the crazy hours at work have meant less time to properly focus on the blog, or the farm, or laundry (its getting a little dire, not gonna lie) so I’m hoping to figure out a way of better juggling it all. Especially come springtime because I have plans! I have so many farm related plans. Some may be cost and time prohibitive, most involve me not breaking myself midsummer and needing to drastically scale back everything, and all of them require a good work life balance.
Also, in a completely unrelated realm of topic: I totally selfishly want credit for recording two 45 second snippets showing off some of the snow and my plans were dashed! Dashed I tell you! By the fact that they simply will. Not. Transfer. Off my phone. Help!
(This may be a sign this blog needs a companion YouTube channel so I could upload off my phone… but that sounds really, really scary). Anyways, if I figure this out, I’ll tack them on to the next post, or maybe just put them in their own little mid-week thing? But that’s putting a lot of confidence in my abilities to make my phone talk to my computer, and they simply won’t! Hatfield’s and McCoys dressed up as windows and android.
Welp, this went entirely off the rails, didn’t it? This is what happens when I can’t be outside. I need spring!
Until we chat again my friends
The Farmer's Blogger 