Dead end of the week

[altivo]

Still cold as a well-digger's ankle (as my father would say) or perhaps as cold as a witch's teat (as my maternal grandmother, a very outspoken woman, would say.) Not quite as cold now, but it was down to 0.9°F this morning according to our thermometers. Mostly sunny today, though so it warmed up quite a bit. Then just at sunset it started to snow a bit. I dunno if that means more snow tonight, but they're saying more for tomorrow. This is starting to feel like last winter, when we broke the records for snowfall in a single season, only this time it's colder. We have four or five inches of snow on the ground now, and it's still drifting readily when there's any wind.

Tess is getting used to it, she didn't accuse me today. Or maybe she believed my excuse that the Aussies, and especially cabcat, have stolen all our heat so they can have summer down there.

Cats are huddling under the comforter on the bed. Someday I'm gonna sit on one of them accidentally. As for the dogs, Simon doesn't mind the cold, he has so much long fur. Sarah, on the other paw, is fairly short coated in spite of her northern ancestry, and parks herself by the woodstove much of the time. I'd put a sweater on her but I'm sure she'd hate it and Simon would just use it as a handle to grab her by. She's younger and usually wins when they wrestle around, so he'd take advantage of any additional handicap he could use I'm sure.

Comments

[flamekist.livejournal.com]

Brrr! 0.9°F is far too cold for this Cajun! Even Atlanta has gotten too cold for my taste. I'll tolerate almost any amount of humidity and heat over being too cold.

Two of our dogs have started taking over any sunny spots they can find in the house. Doesn't matter how inconvienent it is for us humans. The most popular place is right in front of the kitchen sink where they can get hours of direct sunlight coupled with the heater vent. When I come home and start working on dinner they give me this look that says "If you dare make me move I won't hesitate to go on a 3am barking spree!"

[altivo.livejournal.com]

"We don't call that cold in Quebec."

Well, this isn't exactly Quebec, but darned close. Right now, the daytime temperatures get up close to freezing and occasionally above it, but at night we really freeze up. I do think this is colder than what has been normal for early December the last few years, though perhaps not colder than the long term average. Where December was a month of snow when I was a kid in Michigan, it seems to have become a month of rain, sometimes ice, in the last decade or two. In fact, as far back as the 80s I remember going Christmas shopping carrying an umbrella because of the constant drizzle or even hard cold rain.

[soanos.livejournal.com]

Aww... *nuzzles and holds warmly* Remember to stay warm out there :)

[soanos.livejournal.com]

Oh, before I forget... *sends a lot of warmth from Finland to the chilly horsie*

[altivo.livejournal.com]

You're hiding warmth up there? Where'd you steal that from? ;p

[soanos.livejournal.com]

I generate some *radiates some more BTU's for horsies* :)

And it is only -2,2C here. I want a proper cold winter. More like -20C. So I think we have 18C difference I cans end that over, will that be okay? :)

[altivo.livejournal.com]

Sure. If you can find a way to send it, Tess will be pleased. She might even give you a big kiss. ;p

[saythename.livejournal.com]

The old Three Dog Night saying (band name) is now.

The good ole' boy with hosses told me of how he
had to break up ice in the buckets. "Like corncrayte!"

The cats were, in fact, snuggled into my bed also.

Somehow I like it. Maybe its the cozy it gives you
after a long outside workshift, maybe its the fact
that only the idiots like me would go for walks
in this weather with a camera, though I also like
to go out when its in the high 90s for walks too. XD

Fortunetly, natural gas, along with oil and gasoline,
prices are low now, so I can be warm inside when I'm
"I canf talf wife" cold from outside.

[altivo.livejournal.com]

Yup. I don't know from "corncrayte" (or even concrete) but we have to break ice in the buckets now. In fact, we dump the outdoor ones in the evening so that they aren't frozen solid top to bottom by morning. Even with the rubber buckets we use, getting a solid chunk of four gallons or so out can be difficult.

The boys have a heated water tank outdoors and heaters in their buckets indoors. Tess and the sheep just have rubber buckets that will freeze unless they are dumped and refilled a couple of times a day.

[soanos.livejournal.com]

Tess wants a water heater, too ._.

I wish I could buy you all some nice prezzies. :(

[altivo.livejournal.com]

I agree, Tess should have a water heater. The problem is that there is no electric outlet near her stall, so to put one in I have to first install the wiring and outlet. That's sort of convoluted and I keep putting it off.

Instead she has an insulated bucket. It fits into a holder that has a sleeve about 2 cm. thick of plastic foam, and there's a round floating disk of foam on top of the water. It keeps the water from freezing most nights, at least until the temperature gets down to -20C or so. Even then, it prevents freezing for several hours. She learned fast enough to push down the floating disk with her nose in order to get the water.