Category Archives: Weather

100 Words, gardening, home, Nature, Uncategorized, Weather

Rarin’ to Go

37 Comments

Photo credit:  Violeta Pencheva

I am SO impatient to get out into my yard this weekend. I have a couple of errands and one meeting but because I’m eager, I’ve actually put pen to paper to make a schedule.  Do A first, then do B second with times listed so I can get home as fast as possible.

My bales are all conditioned and ready to plant. YA and I hit Bachman’s for the first time last weekend, so the front porch is filled with flowers and veggies.  I’ve gotten some more yard waste bags from the hardware store.  I’m READY.

Anything you are chomping at the bit to get to?

100 Words, gardening, home, Nature, Seasons, Uncategorized, Weather

Simple Gifts

13 Comments

We had almost too warm weather the week before last, and then, this weekend, we had a couple of inches of very wet snow.  Husband and I didn’t mind at all.  We consider this late spring snow a gift.

“Late spring snow is the poor farmer’s fertilizer”, say the almanacs.   This wet, nitrogen-laden snow greens up the pastures and ranges out here, protects the winter wheat, and give us hope that we won’t be in a drought.

What are some simple gifts you received or given lately?

gardening, Nature, News, Poems, Uncategorized, Weather

Cruel April

28 Comments

I just read the NOAA weather map for later this week. Oh my! Minnesota Baboons may get a lot of snow! Son and DIL could get 20 inches in Brookings.

It has warmed up sufficiently here that people are jumping into yard work, cleaning flower beds and mowing lawns (which they oughtn’t do yet as it is too early).  Husband and I are waiting to do any yard work until we return from a trip next Sunday.  We first plan to prepare the garden for pea, lettuce, and spinach seeds, which we will plant later in April.  Husband tilled last fall, so we won’t need to do that now. The tomato and pepper seedlings are coming along under the grow lights, Tulips are up and crocuses are blooming.  We have pruning and flower bed cleaning to do, too.

I always find April a chancy month to garden. One April many years ago I was awaiting the first blooming of some tulips I had planted in the fall, when, on April 28, we got 18 inches of heavy wet snow. The tulips had flower buds just ready to open, and there they were, frozen solid just above the snow line. I had to wait another year to see them bloom.   April is the cruelest month. Sometimes March is just as bad, though.

What are your favorite and least favorite months? Any favorite T.S. Elliot poems? 

 

Business, home, Nature, Stories, Uncategorized, Weather

My Fake Fur

45 Comments

About three years ago I purchased a coat online. I just wanted one really warm coat and I found an on sale faux fur item – a size too big, but I figured I would always be wearing a fat sweater underneath.  I wouldn’t normally wear faux fur, just on principle, but it was such a good price that I went ahead and bought it.  I have a rule for when I wear this coat.  If when I am leaving the house it is 10 degrees or lower, then on goes the white coat, like a wearable weather vane.

This coat gets SO MUCH ATTENTION. People who know my temperature rule mention it, people walking by my cube stop and touch it.  Strangers come up to me and comment.  You’d be amazed at the number of people who think it’s OK to stroke my coat while I am actually wearing it.  Unbelievable.  Honestly I don’t think I have ever worn it that it didn’t get at least one comment during the day.

So I wasn’t surprised on Wednesday when I saw two women motioning to me while I was walking through JoAnn Fabrics. But then as I got closer, I realized one of the women was wearing the same coat!  I asked her if she got the same reactions that I did and she confirmed that her coat is also a magnet for comments and touches.  She’s even had a co-worker take it off the hanger and try it on without asking.

It was a fun 5-minute commiseration before we each went on our way, although by coincidence, we ended up in the check-out line next to each other. The cashier was not impressed by our story.

What do you have that draws attention?

 

home, Nature, Uncategorized, Weather, work

Snow Non-removal

56 Comments

I must warn you all that I am really crabby! We haven’t had a terrible amount of snow this winter, probably only about a foot, but our streets look as though we live in southern Minnesota after a big blizzard.  Our town has a very sad history of snow removal, and after 30 years of living here, I still can’t get used to it. I slide through intersections and almost get stuck on the side streets on my way home.  There are vehicles and trailers parked on the streets around where we live that haven’t been moved in months, and you can tell because there are piles of snow where the city plows have had to work around them.

We are friends with a guy who works for the city and who runs one of the snow plows. He  tells us that if it snows and if it seems like it might warm up and the snow might melt, they won’t plow.  They try to let the warming temps melt the snow. If it turns to ice, so be it.  At least they save the city money.  When they do plow, they scrape everything in front of the driveway so we have to shovel to be able to get the vehicles out. It is maddening!

One April about 25 years ago we had a terrible snow storm that dumped about a foot of snow. Because it was predicted to get warm, they didn’t plow, and we almost destroyed the undercarriage of our vehicle driving over ice ruts in the street because it didn’t warm up, and all the snow just compacted and made every trip in the car a jostling nightmare.  Now I hear that another Arctic air mass will hit us on Sunday.  Enough, already!!

What do you do to cheer up?  How is snow removal handled where you live?

 

home, Nature, Uncategorized, Weather

Snowstorm

64 Comments

Today’s post comes from Barbara In Rivertown.

WELL, I guess we’ve finally got our snow, at least here in Minnesota. I remember, at the end of that December-January dry spell saying “Oh, we really need some snow or there will be a drought come April, when there’s supposed to be a thaw.” Watch what you ask for – request was granted!

It was so pretty that I took some photos, and Ben sent a few taken from his driveway. A friend of mine has allowed me to post one she took on her patio, that is quite naturally dubbed The Birthday Cake.

There will no doubt be more snow – heck, we’re not even through February!

What’s the longest you’ve been snowed in somewhere – where you really couldn’t get out?

What’s a great “snowed-in” story from a movie or book?

Uncategorized, Weather, Words

Silk Purses and Sows Ears

30 Comments

Like most of the Baboons, I am completely done with this cold weather. We haven’t had a great quantity of snow here in western ND, but the cold is really wearing on us. The only positive thing I can think about it is that prolonged cold like this kills Emerald Ash Borers.

I remember once in grad school when a friend was dismayed to find that he and his girlfriend were going to have a baby. Another friend tried to be positive and told him “Well, at least you know that the bullets aren’t blank”.  I don’t know how comforting that was, but at least the friend tried to make a silk purse out of a sow’s ear.

Give some examples of helpful (or not so helpful) positive spin.