It’s the last and prettiest of the pretty days the forecast allows. According to the weatherman – who has been eerily accurate lately – we’re heading back into cold and wet territory tonight or tomorrow, so I figured I’d better get some things done.
A third of the way through winter, and I’m now confident that I’ve well and truly shaken my chimney fire phobia – which means I’m down to cleaning the stovepipe no more often than once a month. 🙂
Which, unfortunately, means that cleaning it makes a horrible sooty mess and the house cleanup takes longer than the stovepipe cleaning does. That didn’t actually occur to me before. So stovepipe, then stove, then floor, then hair and bod, then clothing… I may need to work on my technique. A bit.
I normally do my battery maintenance rounds on the first of the month, but Jan 1 was kind of cold. So I did it yesterday, when the afternoon temp was at least a little above freezing. And since today was nice and sunny I took the opportunity to run an equalization charge on my own batteries. That involves four hours of pouring scary amounts of electricity into my expensive batteries in hope of boiling any sulfate deposits off the plates.
I would have held off on the electrolyte chores until today, if I’d known it was going to get into the fifties with no wind. Next few days are supposed to be cloudy and rainy. I’m looking at the bright side, if the nights stay cloudy maybe they won’t get as frigid as they have stayed all month. Ya think?
You have sun and we got snow, ain’t winter nice? Looks like the law of unintended consequences has caught up to you regarding the wood stove. On the plus side at least you can sleep soundly now that it looks like you are not going to make a fuel of yourself…
The weathertainers have issued a cold weather alert for the area.It might actually hit -27 C (16 deg F). Hell that’s not even cold enough for long johns. :^)
Good luck with the cold-and-muddy, Joel.
We seem to have been sharing a weather pattern. We went from cold and rainy to brilliantly sunny but absolutely ass-freezing. Today we’re about to plunge back into cold and rainy again. Why, oh why, oh why can’t we go back to warm and … anything? I’d settle for “vaguely warmish.” Well, El Nino is still holding out that promise here in the North WET. But looks as if you — and MJR — may be in for long, unpleasant winters from here on out.
And I know all too well how your soil turns into glue and ice. Ugh! Glad you got some major chores done.