Does Something Smell Like Burnt Toast...?

Up here, 'Snow Removal' means the snow comes along and removes what you have by crushing it.

Almost two months after our series of Pineapple Express blizzards, the snow has finally melted off enough to see the totality of its work--this is the first day I could walk around the small run to see the back.

I must say, it was effective. And notice our next storm working up in the background, there.

The small chicken run it crushed, fortunately uninhabited at the time:

Really did a number on the door and popped it from its frame.

The side...

Yikes, this isn't getting any better as I round the corner...

Urgh...the back of the run.

The way the weight of the snow just...bent and snapped steel pipe is impressive. Tore the hardware cloth like it was nothing, too.

Le sigh...Welp, now to rebuild it from the ground up. We can reuse the door and some of the hardware cloth, possibly some of the steel pipe, fasteners, etc...

Our landscaping took a hit as well, luckily just broken branches. The house rode the storms like a champ, although it does now have some little gaps here and there where wall meets ceiling that weren't there before...

I'll take it.

Snowpocalypse!

And it really, really means it this time.

It's been snowing since New Year's Eve, we got three feet of snow overnight on December 31st alone. And then it just kept snowing. 

We woke up New Year's Day to that dead silence you get when the power is out. Uh oh...

Here's a small sample of my last 4 days, when overnight on NYE we lost our power/Internet/Heat/Phone and were catapulted back to the 1870's. My little green 1970's Panasonic Panapet transistor radio was hauled out of storage, fed a fresh 9V battery and put to work.

 Ahhh...the good ol' days, when you froze your ass off.

But back to Snowpocalypse.

See how deep the tire tracks are, on the extreme left in the first pic below?

To the question, 'Can my husband, driving the family car, make it home for two days when it's this deep?'

The answer is:  'LOL, No.'

We had no way to communicate with each other, we all just had to hope everyone was okay. Since we knew this storm was coming, we'd already agreed ahead of time that if he couldn't get home he'd either hole up at work, or the local casino/lodge if they had rooms available (on NYE. LOL).

So...he had to spend NYE and the next day at the casino/lodge (they had generators, so had power) along with 90 billion drunks and other stuck locals, camped out in a chair in a corner (no rooms to be had, naturally). People slept on the floors all over, and the staff kept the booze flowing to keep everyone happy.

It wasn't until two of our neighbors got out their backhoes and plowed the entire neighborhood for blocks and blocks around us that he made it home...

...two days later. And even then; it took hours, cost us a busted tailight cover, and he just barely got here.

Our town was so snowed under they couldn't even keep the main highway driveable, so I can't fault them, they had their hands full. Our area never sees snow this deep; for so long, with so many heavy storms in quick succession, and with snow that doesn't melt. Everything was frozen to a standstill.

We've been without power/heat/Internet/phone for the last 4 days, finally got it back today. Downed trees/power lines are everywhere, and it's SO COLD. My little woodburning fireplace, a PILE of candles and our body heat is all that kept our pipes from freezing--so even if we could have gotten out, we weren't going to abandon the house.

To the end of our driveway was as far as I could get, the snow was hip-deep on me. Our cars are under there, somewhere...I don't even want to think about the condition of the convertible top on the Plymouth. Suffice to say it's gone.

The chickens had their own personal Ice Fortress. You can see the top of the small run on the right, touching the ground.

The kid had to shovel a path to even get to them first. 

 

The small run, on the right, is now officially, fully toast.

 

I mean...

 

Full-on, irretrievably blackened, fills-your-house-with-that-burnt-toast-stink, toast.

My neighbor up on his roof doing snow removal.

 

But before the snow really arrived, the wind destroyed my front screen door--so Howling Nevada Windstorm got its licks in, too. Can't let Snowpocalypse have all the fun!

 

 

With the power out, we transfer anything perishable to coolers packed with snow. I mean, there's literally tons of the stuff just lying around, it can pull its damned weight.

  

2023 so far can BITE ME.

 

 

A Little Time Lapse Of How Things Went...

So New Year's Eve started off okay. Husband at work, the kid and I at home. We'd prepared for the Pineapple Express by stocking up, securing everything, bringing in firewood...

It had been raining heavily for days, everything was a foot deep in water when it began to snow on NYE around 11AM. Anyone who recalls the Walker River CA flood of 1997 knows the conditions were identical...this is NOT a good thing.

11AM. BIG fat clumps of snow! Small run on right has a bit of a bent top from our last snowstorm, but is intact.

Same view, 3PM...Top of small run bending under heavy snow.

Front yard, 11AM...

Same view,  3PM...

Same view, 6PM... The chairs are disappearing and the fireplug outside the fence is gone, LOL.

Midnight! A foot and a half deep and still snowing heavily.

Requisite snow angel is made, second thoughts halfway through are evident.

At this point, the kid and I had our champagne, which had been properly chilled...

 ...and went to bed.

Things got way worse by dawn.

One Of The First Signs Of Winter...

 ...are the upside-down traffic cameras around here.

Our big storms are always preceded by a Howling Nevada Windstorm, whose job it is to not only relocate your trash can five blocks over, but also beat the traffic cams into submission and flip them over. Last week, out in Washoe Valley not one of the five traffic cams was pointed at the road. Instead they showed cows...the sides of hills...some guy's truck in his yard...

They still work, of course. So we get fun views like this, with upside-down trees:

Last year was better though:

To be fair, this was just ahead of the storm that left us with this:

Can't wait to see what we get before the year ends!

In Which We Get The Entirety Of Winter, In Three Days

The day before Christmas we got a pretty fair snowstorm, it laid down around four to six inches of snow.

Most of it on our cars, of course...

Later on that day, things took a turn for the weird as the wind kicked back up again, blowing shrieking gusts that blew the snow around like a scene straight out of National Geographic show on Antarctica.

I stuck my head out just long enough to snap a couple of pictures, hollering, 'Ow, ow, OW!' as tiny ice pellets peppered my face. So ridiculously painful that I couldn't help but laugh.

The neighbor's house had a cool, wavy drift on the right hand side of the roof...

Before the entire house almost disappeared under a windy onslaught.

But how are things in the chicken yard, I hear you ask--how do the chickens feel about this weaponized snow?

I dunno, 'cause I ain't goin' out there!

We know when Mother Nature has won, and wisely decide to stay in the house and admire the sparkly tree.

The kid put her snowbound time to good use by constructing the gingerbread house kit we'd gotten her.

 

Don't all gingerbread houses feature a crime scene?

 

She says the other penguin committed the murder, but that house is looking awfully angry...and has a biblically-correct angel hiding up under the eaves.

'Twas the night before Christmas, and all through the house...

Came the sound of two parents hauling a truly gigantic Yamaha keyboard out to the living room!

Pardon the murky pics, I took these in the dark.

 

But at last, Christmas came!

I got the husband these two pins from Roamin Bison Workshop on Etsy, and they are GORGEOUS.

 

He got me two novels by John Scalzi--although 'The Kaiju Preservation Society' is a preorder, gonna have to wait on that one...and I'm gonna have to wait on 'Redshirts' as well, since I'm 1/3 of the way through 'Going Postal' by Terry Pratchett right now. Bonus pic of the Effin Birds coffee cup I got last year.

I also got some nifty pins and stickers! A geometric dragonfly (which fits in nicely with the origami I make) by Mary Capaldi, along with a cute cicada sticker. The 'Chaotic Good' pin is from Look Human and I can't wait to wear it.

And then there's this wonderful brass spider hair fork from Bronze Smith on Etsy.

All the way from Wales, the kid got this jaw-droppingly cool Mari Lwyd coloring book from Skulls And Sheets.

 

Bonus envelope art, yay!

A can't decide which page I like best!

And lastly, I forgot to get a pic, but I got the kid this great, 'Be Crow Do Crimes' patch, also from Roamin Bison...because everyone needs a patch depicting a knife-wielding corvid, don't they?

So now, three days later, we've got another snowstorm moving in, which is supposed to dump anywhere from three to seven inches of fresh snow on top of the stuff that is still layin' around from the other day.

Looks like an excellent time to stay inside, make cookies and remark, 'Isn't that pretty!'