Yesterday morning started at barely 3F. It was gusty and the 4-5 inches of snow that had fallen since I last cleared the driveway was blowing around. I didn’t have to go anywhere and no deliveries were expected so I decided to wait for the wind to die down and hopefully a bit more warmth before playing with the snowblower again.

The sun came out, the wind quit and it did warm up to about 14F – by 4 p.m. Karl and I set out on a snowshoe/walk – too nice to be snowblowing!

We had taken a short walk in the morning, but it was overcast and blustery. This afternoon walk was wonderful. The wind had blown the new snow into such smooth contours that it looked like a painting of snow. It was such a soft, pretty look to the landscape that I hated to make tracks through it.

We dawdled. Karl took a break to clean ice balls from between his toes…it’s a problem! Often, he will stop and hold one paw piteously in the air and wait for me to get to him and fix it. Today, though, he decided he would do it all by himself!

Back at the house, I took a look at the driveway and thought that I should probably fire up the snowblower and clean things up. So I fired up the grill and cooked some hamburgers for my dinner…

About the time I was thinking that the snowblowing could wait until morning, my neighbor arrived…in his tractor-backhoe! He had emailed me the night before saying he was going to work on his and his adjoining neighbor’s drives and did I want a clean up. Thinking I was going to clear my own drive in the morning, I emailed that back but asked if he could clear the end of my drive if the county plow had been by and blocked it in.

Mike works for the county road department and up until this year not only was our road on his plowing route, but the county sent him home with the plow so he plowed the road on his way out, i.e. first thing. This year his route was changed, some “stranger” is plowing our road and the county is low on funds after last summer’s gas prices. Plowing all over the valley is not what it was.

All to say, that Mike KNOWS how to run a plow – tractor – backhoe (see the great garden trade ) and as he came up the driveway, I congratulated myself on my uncharacteristic procrastination.

As I’m preparing this post, Wednesday morning … it is 2 below zero. Bundling up to go out with Karl on a short walk is one thing. Flinging powdery snow around that has a tendency to drift back on me is quite another – thanks Neighbor!!