SNOW! Well, Yeah, But...Also, Nature's Caltrops!

So we had our first snowstorm of the year the other day, the kid was all excited about it for two days beforehand. Despite us telling her it wouldn't get down to our elevation, she was hopeful...

She asked if we could 'walk up to the snow' and we had to gently tell her that no, that snow was about 2000 feet higher than where we were standing, and we weren't hiking up there today. Patience, grasshopper, soon there will be PLENTY of snow to play in.

What's that creeping up onto my porch...?

We've done some house hunting in the last couple of weeks, and THESE damned things...Bullheads...are everywhere up here. The plant in the pictures was only one of many crawling it's way towards the house we were touring. Anyone with any sense HATES the damned things like nothing else. Go barefoot just once outside and you are in for a howling good time. Because they never, NEVER lie flat and harmless--they always have at least one or two points sticking up, and they are virtually uncrushable when you stomp on them. They don't do the decent thing that plants are supposed to do and rot over time, either. Like cockroaches, they never die.

A close-up of Nature's Caltrops!

What makes them extra-nasty is that they embed themselves in your shoes so that they get tracked into the house, where they then hook into the carpet, coming OFF your shoe...and later, after you shower and are padding around barefoot with bare feet tenderized by soaking in hot water....you find them.

I may start a public service of 'Bullhead Removal Via Flamethrower'. Hell, I could Tom Sawyer it up and charge people for the privilege of torching the damned things themselves.