Wow, it feels like a late December morning in Michigan…

Four inches of snow in a night! I know that’s not a lot to some of you – but this is the southwest desert and it’s a lot.

It’s really kind of pleasant – not at all cold, there was an honest 3.5 measured inches of snow on the solar panels…

…and it’s wet and eminently packable – perfect snowman weather. I was having nostalgic thoughts until just a few minutes ago when I cleaned off the Jeep and remembered that the problem with Michigan mornings like this was the endless drive to work on roads packed with other idiots just like me and the sharply-reduced chance of completing it without an expensive, disruptive and possibly very painful collision – or series of collisions. Then I decided I wasn’t so nostalgic after all.

I’ve only cleaned off the lower panels, for all the good it will do…

I can clean off the roof-mounted panels but there’s some hazard involved with the iced-up aluminum ladder, which is why I decided right off that the new rack would be nearer ground level. Not that it matters a lot at the moment because there’s nothing remotely like direct sunlight at present and the big panels will probably become snow-covered soon again anyway. But my system is so overpowered for the size of the battery bank that I don’t need direct sun to charge the batteries. Right now of course my power input will be sharply diminished if there’s any at all – but it doesn’t matter because my battery bank is more than adequate to my actual power usage. Win/win. And if all hell breaks loose and the batteries do begin to suffer, I can pour some gas in the Honda and – gasp – run the generator. Which all the neighbors are probably already doing and thinking nothing of it. Heh: Sometimes going to extremes can be fun.

And now I must go out on the rock-strewn but traffic-free wash to feed chickens. Just occurred to me that I won’t be able to see the path, but there’s no way I can climb the driveway so the wash is the only available road. Oh well – I may end up high-centered on a rock but I won’t collide with some poor schlub’s shiny SUV.