Home Alone- 3

"Last day of freedom from tyranny and oppression." Not really but the people are on their way home today so we shall meet up this evening (I had a speech worked out after the first line but didn't want to bore you with it.) Also last day of work this week as I am off tomorrow! Yes!
Spent some time yesterday evening covering up what I could due to the frost warning. After looking at some other blogs today I feel lucky. Snow in mid- April? Nope. It's been a winter to remember for a while. I do predict a decent summer this year. Maybe a little on the cool side but none of the Ark- building rains we had last year (fingers crossed.)

Picture from webcam just a few minutes ago.

All of the plants seem to have made it through OK the last few nights. Surprising for me as usually there's something that always goes wrong. 

Case in point; walking dogs this morning, one pulls and phone goes flying out of my hand. Shattered screen. Something for tomorrow but something I didn't want to deal with. 

See you later. :/

I Told You So Part Deux

We made it through the night and today without losing power so that's a good thing. It did sleet some this morning and snow this afternoon but when I got up from my nap (no comments please) the snow quit and the roads were somewhat passable. Must have warmed up some during the nap phase. I did try to head out this morning, a quick trial run of the back roads (that's all that surround us), and there were two ruts that if you didn't follow them you were off in the ditch. I could have made it out and to work today but the DOT was begging people to stay home and who am I to argue with them? 

My side window was down, that's just the ice build- up.

This afternoon's pre- nap snow.

And a sneak attack by my lovely wife. Me and my girl snoozing away. I thought about not posting this but what the hell. We were tired. And someone will get hers; bwahahahahaha. 

Alrighty, enough about snow and bad weather from me. This past weekend I started all of my pepper plants for the year since it takes 'forever' for these things to grow. Green Bell and Red Bell from my saved seeds, California Wonder and Hot Salsa Mix from Burpee, Sweet Bananas from Sow True Seeds, and Perfection (True Heart) from Southern Exposure. My trial testing on my saved seeds has resulted in good germination results, about 75%. If anyone is interested in any of these seeds or any of the other ones I have let me know. I am creating a Seed page if you're interested. I may get crazy and start my remaining ones this weekend as family is coming in the middle of next week and next weekend will be busy. Oh, I managed not to get my Lavender started, as in nothing happened. Maybe they were bad, who knows. 

Haven't seen Skeleton on the Olympics yet. I probably slept through it. 

I Told You So......

I had this feeling a long time ago that we would be in for a much different winter this year. Cold, snow, more cold, ice, rinse and repeat. It started snowing yesterday afternoon and by the time that was done we had about 2" on the ground. Called off work this morning as I was not going to get into the mess in the capital city. Started in again right before lunch and when that snow was done we accumulated another 4". Then the ice came and dumped a good coating on us. Now as I type this we are getting some minor rain and sleet thrown in. Ice starts again early in the morning and will die off sometime before lunch. We'll see.

Might as well get out and have some fun.

Why I didn't go to work today?

The Skeleton is running tomorrow in the Olympics so kinda want to check that out as my Curling teams aren't doing very well. 

Check in tomorrow. Oh, one last word.

Snow in the South

Sucks. Plain and simple. The natives here absolutely do not know how to drive in the white stuff. I was in Greenville, SC when this 'storm' hit and let me tell you it was pandamonium. They got enough snow to make a foot print. A little ice thrown in with a dash of cold temperatures and there you go. I was supposed to go to Charleston, SC but upon hearing that they pretty much shut the city down, I decided that home would be a better option. Cars everywhere; ditches, guardrailed, a few on their sides. The main highways around town were clear but roads around where we live are pretty bad. Squeak has a few snow days and the dogs are 50/50 on the snow. At least I didn't have to shovel the driveway.

As I said the dogs were 50/50. Ginny (Woffie) doesn't like for the snow to be on her paws as Chewie (Chewdude) loves the snow. This all according to The Wife. 

I actually did some work in the garden this past weekend. I took up all of the root crops and tilled everything over, then tilled on a few more feet to the main bed, so it is now 30'-0" x 30'-0". With that I can't wait to get the celery starts I have going into the ground. I haven't killed these as I did the onions. 

I started two different types of eggplant last weekend (Black Beauty and Long 'something') as well as a plat of lavender and a few sacrificial pepper seeds I saved. I tried this once before but forgot what I did with them. Here's hoping for better luck. 

WOF of the week. I will spare you the full shot and give you the close- up. 

Until next time stay off of the roads for goodness sake! People are crazy kids. 

Temptations

Well it is that particular time of year that makes me want to start putting seeds into dirt and under lights. The temptation is there to see something grow beyond my waistline (which is actually going down some lately.) Packets and packets call my name throughout the evening. Celery seedlings taunt the others. The glow of light through the windows makes the neighbors suspicious. Temptations. It's there and hard to overcome but I will prevail. I will be starting the eggplants this weekend but everything else will be according to schedule. Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr............... Well, I may 'try' a few of my saved pepper seeds to see if I knew what I was doing. No sense in taking chances.:) Oh, and I killed all of the onion seedlings. I apparently can't grow the damn things.

Other nonsense.
Played some paintball with my boys this past weekend. Note to self, don't park next to a field where there are private parties going on.

I did knock something else off of my list; I built our paintball marker holders. All said and done cost me about $12.00 each. 

And last but not least our first snowfall of the year. 

People here really panic when it snows Took me an hour and a half to get home last night. They delayed all of the schools by two hours this morning for really nothing. There was enough at the homestead to make a foot print but nothing on any of the roads. It has turned colder and it seems to be here for a little while. Our average high in January is about 51 but we are running at about upper 30s and lower 40s for a while. Definitely colder this year from last. 

I am going to do a little more work on my 'list' and keep it in the side bar so you know what I have done and what I need to do. Signing off for now. Hope you have enough for a snowman kids.