December 18, 2008
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Yo Yo Temps
I haven’t said much about the weather lately. I have had other things to blog about, and other people have had more interesting weather than we have, but most of all the weather has been jerking me around so much lately I haven’t even wanted to think about it. We are running low on water and need to go to the spring, and will, soon… if the weather cooperates.
The temperatures have swung from teens below zero to teens above zero and back again more times than I kept track of in the past week or so. Each time it made an upswing, more snow fell. Then just when the snow stopped falling and we started shoveling out and brushing off the car, it got frigid again and we would agree to put off the water run. We have put it off just about as long as we can. Maybe we can go when it gets light tomorrow.
Last night was one of the coldest. I went to bed with the hot water bottle at my feet and my little blue hat on my head. Now, it’s almost as far above zero as it was below zero this morning, and it hasn’t started snowing yet. I suppose I’m not being realistic, hoping that it’s not going to snow tonight. When warmer air moves into a cold place, it drops precipitation: elementary meteorology. When both the cold place and the warmer air are below freezing, that precip will be snow: elementary again.
We still have not shoveled the whole driveway or the roofs since the last three or four snowfalls. Greyfox and Doug have told me I should not be shoveling snow, given the way my body reacted after the last couple of times I snoveled. Doug did get the part of the driveway right around and just behind the car shoveled about two snowfalls ago, but then it was really cold, and we weren’t quite out of water, so we put off the trip to the spring.
This is an old established pattern for us. Eventually, the water supply runs too low to put it off any longer, and it is winter, or at least it looks and feels like winter, and we are in Alaska, so we gear up and go on and do it in the cold… if the car starts. If not, he takes a bucket and the sled and calls on a neighbor who has a well. This weekend is the Solstice. I’m ready for days to start getting longer. Tomorrow the sun rises at 10:23 and sets at 3:30 – five hours and seven minutes of daylight. Yeh, I’m ready for more.
Comments (8)
More sunlight would be nice here too. lol
Stay warm.
Wait…I am confused. You have no running water?? I can’t even imagine that. How spoiled I am and never even realize it! Try and stay warm!
We’re going to see the sun today. High of 27-ish F they’re saying. So we can have freezing rain, sleet and then snow! Yay!
At least I don’t have to trudge out to a spring to get water. I didn’t even want to walk out to the mailbox to get the mail…
We are having similar weather just not as cold as you are…although we did hit the record cold a few night ago at 25 below
there are three seasons, and i like two of them. summer i like. winter i like….
the third,? you ask?
there is summer, winter…and all that crappy stuff in between.
@the_nthian - Between the end of summer and beginning of winter, we have winterization, hurrying to get the roof repaired, firewood in, etc., before it’s too late. Between the end of winter and the beginning of summer, we have breakup, when all the shit and carrion of the winter melts and starts to rot. I don’t even wanna think about it.
Oh, I admire you, but don’t envy you. I think freezing temperature (32F) is very cold, and we have that temperature here often enough. We have had lots of that already this year. I have figured it out, though. It must be the pipeline that is getting the Alaskan news here, is also bringing some of the colder temps this way. Fort Mills is about an hour or so from here. lol. Slide on down the pipeline and visit sometime.
@closethippie - That pipeline runs from Prudhoe Bay to Valdez, Alaska. I’d have a long swim from there.