…and sigh again. Only Joel can turn a sunny day into a crisis.

It rained and rained yesterday afternoon. Never got a full charge in the batteries, so last night I went out and turned the inverter right off for only the second time since installing those great 12V LEDs last year. People told me when I started wiring the cabin that I should use 12V lighting and I blew them off, and normally I find it still doesn’t matter much even with my tiny battery bank. But when voltage really is a concern, the fact that the inverter itself is drawing juice becomes inescapable and there you are: You can leave it on and let it suck down the last of your voltage, or turn it off and go without lights. Thanks to Big Brother’s* gift of a retrofit kit and some expensive 12V LED bulbs I now have the best of both worlds.

Then the clouds cleared out overnight, and of course the temperature cratered. I expected both things, but not below freezing. A look at the heavy frost got me moving because I’d left something half-done at Landlady’s which must not be allowed to freeze. The boys got their walky rather earlier than usual.

Since I’m not yet acclimated I bundled up, which of course was a mistake because in the sun it isn’t that cold. Now I smell like a goat and need an early wash because I’m meeting L to go to town. But it did give me a chance to play with my new fashion statement…

I try something like this nearly every winter and usually give it up. But this time I actually bought a proper belt and found a more appropriate holster and it might work. I get tired of the gun being buried under layers in the winter and figure an old-fashioned separate gunbelt might be the answer. A lack of a proper belt and holster doomed earlier efforts to frustration, but this seems better. In a box of holster junk in the barn I found this ancient low-hung holster that fit the .44 pretty well. A high-rise in the modern style does not work very well with a separate belt. We’ll see if this doesn’t become more of an annoyance than it’s worth, in any case I wanted to start breaking in a new belt.

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*No, really, it came from my older brother.