Thoughts on Winter

[stella1751]

It's 20 degrees outside; tomorrow's forecast low is 18. The garden is covered with yesterday's snow, which will probably stick around for a few days, based upon the three-day forecast.

Even though I dread winter, I feel almost relieved when it finally arrives. From August on in this country, I worry and wonder how long I have until I lose everything. I scrutinize each plant, wondering whether it will be able to achieve its full potential before dying.

Once winter arrives, I don't worry anymore. It's a done deal. Those plants fortunate enough to have survived the winds and the sporadic untimely freezes are a pleasant memory that will hold me until spring. Those whose lives were cut short by unexpected climatic anomolies are briefly mourned and the experience stored for future reference.

Now, I anticipate spring. It will be a long winter. It always is up here: five to six months of unrelenting cold, snow, and wind tend to stay with a person after most of a lifetime spent in the High Plains. However, the anticipation is addictive. When this time of year rolls around, I always regret not having had more time, and I always think ahead with anticipation.

No more dreading the onset of winter; it is here. Now I can tick off the days until spring arrives. In less than four months, it will be March, with its promise of the occasional plus-40 day. I can now hope for the best instead of dreading the worst

[applestar]

Wow! I can't imagine winter like that.

What kind of outdoor activities do you enjoy? I was just looking at the LLBean catalog and flipping past the snowshoes, cross-country skis and running sleds that we would only have use for every 10 years or so (last winter being one good example). A local wildlife sanctuary/nature park holds a sled dog demo during their annual winter festival. Most times, they have to use the wheeled training sled.

[Charlie MV]

Stella, my dog looks at me like that when I play my harmonica. Then she howls.

We have about 20 winter nights in the 20s and 5 in the teens. We just bushogged the main gardens today although we still have tomatoes and snap beans making. No frost yet.

We boat more from September to May than we do in the summer. It's really cold if you fall overboard but if you stay dry, not so much. I'm not sure we would be able to learn to survive in that climate at our age.

Are there places up there that will help teach basic survival? Sounds like you could die on the way to the grocery store if you aren't prepared. We made the drive in early October from Yellowstone to Jackson Hole . From the rolling brown hills of grass to the near vertical mountains, we drove in awe with our mouths hanging open. It's a beautiful place but I really don't think I'd survive the first winter.

[stella1751]

Stella, my dog looks at me like that when I play my harmonica. Then she howls.

We have about 20 winter nights in the 20s and 5 in the teens. We just bushogged the main gardens today although we still have tomatoes and snap beans making. No frost yet.

We boat more from September to May than we do in the summer. It's really cold if you fall overboard but if you stay dry, not so much. I'm not sure we would be able to learn to survive in that climate at our age.

Are there places up there that will help teach basic survival? Sounds like you could die on the way to the grocery store if you aren't prepared. We made the drive in early October from Yellowstone to Jackson Hole . From the rolling brown hills of grass to the near vertical mountains, we drove in awe with our mouths hanging open. It's a beautiful place but I really don't think I'd survive the first winter.

You can definitely read dogs, Charlie MV! I was on my knees, getting myself on Dempsey's level, when I took that photo. I had to snap it quickly because that's his pre-attack look. Seconds later, I was on my back and he was maniacally mock-biting my arms while I tried to fend him off. He thought it was a great game

Winter isn't as bad in High Plains Wyoming as it is in the Western mountain regions. Well, I guess it depends on whether you most dread snow or wind. They get a great deal of snow; we mostly get wind and cold. It's amazing, though, how the wind can turn even 1" of snow-cover into a blinding ground blizzard.

We all keep basic survival necessities in our car trunks year around. Right now mine has a shovel, a pair of heavy socks, a pair of heavy water-proof gloves, a thick knit cap, a tow rope, and battery cables, just small items tucked in the back. These stay in the car year around. If I plan to travel out of the residential areas, I'll throw in a blanket, a bag of cat litter or sand, and a scarf to wrap around my face if I have to walk. Cell phones, by the way, had to have been invented with winter survival in mind.

The key to survival up here, though, isn't about how to handle being stranded in the cold; it's all about how to avoid being stranded in the cold. Only visitors and young, reckless residents (been there; done that) take chances with traveling during dangerous conditions or travel without first checking the road conditions. Once you've left the city limits, there are stretches of nothing but antelope for ten or twenty miles in places. You're pretty much on your own

[tomf]

Where I live the winters are not so cold we only get a limited amount of days where every thing is frozen but it storms a lot. Our snow fall is due to elevation so the mountains get 400 inches or more a year when Portland may get none. We live between Portland and Mt. Hood, our home is at 1200’. We are forecast to have a cold wet winter this year so we may get some snow this year, it may even stick around for a week or more. Last year we did not get much and I never had to plow the road.
Winter is ok with me, if I can't work outside then I can play music or do art. I have tons of projects on the house I can do inside. I hope to spend a lot of time on my fat skis; fat skis are for deep powder. We hope to ski 3 times a week this year. I would like to take a few snow shoe trips with my camera. Speaking of cameras I am looking at getting a helmet video cam so I can video the mountain. I got a generator this fall and I am finishing wiring the transfer box to the breaker boxes so I should fine when the power goes out this winter; it does so a few times in the winter. I am still getting ready for winter and just finished picking the last crops from the garden.

[stella1751]

In my opinion, snow is worse than cold. I feel pretty lucky living in the High Plains, where wind and cold is more prevalent than snow. You never know what to expect when driving in snow. If it's the heavy, wet, sticky stuff, it grabs your tires and can drag you off the road or into oncoming traffic.

If the snow comes down light and dusty, odds are high it's cold enough for there to be an ice-pack or ice-slick from the previous snow beneath it. It's like driving over flour on glass, and you never know when you'll hit a slick patch that sends you flying into a ditch and bouncing over a barbed wire fence to rocket pell-mell across a corn-stubbled field, as happened to me once when I was living in SD. (Four-wheel drive is virtually worthless on black ice )

The wet, heavy snows wreak havoc on your trees and house and fences. You'll wake up to what sounds like gunfire as freeze-crisped trees shed branches that just can't bear all that weight. Without a decent wind, that heavy wet stuff will perch on your roof, no matter how steep. I've seen it pile up a good foot or two, and I've worried about how much weight the roof will bear before it gives. Then the wind finally comes, too late to scoop the sun-hardened stuff off the roof, but soon enough to cunningly rearrange the snow along the fences, pounding it down to a hard crust so your livestock can wander across and flounder about in the soft stuff left in sun- and wind-free zones like ditches.

I need to have a hard winter; it's what I like best because I need my springs to be spectacular, a genuine rebirth of the countryside. However, I'll take my winters without all that snow, thank you very much

[tomf]

Stella this is why I like where I live we have green grass down low and snow in the mountains, as a skier this is a good combination.

[Charlie MV]

Stella, you're not much of a "move to Wyoming" chamber of commerce. We'd be dead by late November and probably not found until May. We are usually wearing shorts at out Thanksgiving gathering. This year we should have fresh tomatoes. Your summers probably get really hot too.

We want to move out of South Carolina in favor of a cooler place with better health insurance laws. Vermont is in the lead. I figure we can come south and stay on the boat in Columbia from October to April . I will have to learn to winterize the house and not my skinny carcass.

[stella1751]

I've lived in many of the Plains states, and the worst by far are the Dakotas. They tend to suffer from both of the worst weather systems: the Pacific snows that move from Washington state across the nation and the Alberta Clippers that slide down from Alaska. It's one cold front after another during the Dakota winters.

Wyoming mostly gets its weather from the Pacific. The cold fronts creep over the Rockies and then seem to gain strength when they hit the Eastern base, which is the High Plains. That's when we get the wind and the bone-chilling cold.

Northern Montana can be dangerous, too. When I was a kid, I can remember my parents going to some holiday party, either for Christmas or New Years. They returned home early. One of my mother's friends had left to do some shopping in Shelby, which I think was 30 or so miles away. An unexpected storm had blown in, and she hadn't returned. She and her children (two or three, but I can't remember) were found the next day. The car had slid off the road and been covered in snow. The mother left the car running for heat, and they all perished of carbon monoxide poisoning.

My parents lived in Vermont years ago. I visited them there in the fall, and I have to tell you that they have the most spectacular fall I have ever seen. Even Colorado's golden aspens can't compete with the brilliant foliage they have out there. I think Vermont's winters are gentler and kinder than the Plains winters. I think they get the snow, but I'd be surprised to hear they get the wind and cold. People lived in houses called, I think, "salt boxes," taller than they were wide. It's a very pretty country, though!

[tomf]

Back in NE we used to say the winter kills old cars and people, sad but true.

[stella1751]

Back in NE we used to say the winter kills old cars and people, sad but true.

I haven't ever heard that one, but you're right. It is sad but true. My father, a North Dakota farmer for the first part of his life, always said the cold keeps the riffraff out. "Riffraff" had a double-meaning: Bugs and the homeless. This is another sad but true statement: We don't have a large homeless population in this country.

[tedln]

I'm retiring my garden one bed at a time. I still have lettuce, cucumbers, onions, tomatoes, turnips, and a few other things producing. We are supposed to drop into the mid 20's on thanksgiving, so I guess I will have all my beds retired by then.

I'm really looking forward to the cold weather. While I enjoy summer for a lot of reasons including gardening, I really prefer winter weather. I've always enjoyed camping in the winter, even in the snow. Winter has a calmness and a quiteness that I enjoy. I love the cold, crisp air that lets me hear birds from a greater distance. I've been out when it was so quite that I could hear the snow flakes landing in the trees and on the ground. Many people don't believe me, but you really can hear snow falling.

I used to travel a lot in Kansas and Oklahoma in the winter. I always carried a sleeping bag, jar of peanut butter, box of saltine crackers, and a gallon of water during the winter for emergencies. I've driven through a lot of blizzards, but I've never been stranded on the highway. I've been snowed into motels a few times and couldn't leave for a few days.

We are meeting some friends to ride our ATV's in East Texas on the day after Thanksgiving. The temps are supposed to be real low, but we will bundle up and be warm. Thats how I like to spend my winters.

Ted

[Charlie MV]

Back in NE we used to say the winter kills old cars and people, sad but true.

The cumulative age of our truck , car and boat is 59. It sounds like we must stay in the land of 9 fingered people.

[applestar]

Alright Charlie, I HAD to find out what that 9 fingered people ref was ... And found a blog that quoted the passage from Deliverance by James Dickey. Is that it? It sounds like your kind of a novel.

[stella1751]

Thanks for researching this, Applestar! It was making me crazy, but I decided it was some regional thing and was embarrassed to demonstrate my ignorance. Deliverance, huh?

[lorax]

OK, Stella, you've managed to remind me quite acutely of why I moved to the tropics - here, snow is something I can look at from afar, and cold is 40F.

I'm originally from Northern Alberta, whence your famed "Alberta Clippers" - we had extreme snow and extreme winds, and extreme cold. To answer Charlie's question from earlier, all northern Canadians are trained in avoidance and survival from the first day of elementary school - we learned what to do with hypothermia cases almost before we learned the times tables. It's part of the fall curriculum of all schools. We also learned how to survive if you do end up stranded for whatever reason - it's easier in the North where there's accumulated snow, because you can dig yourself into it. On the plains where the wind whips most of it away, it's much harder to survive exposure.

I recall years when at this time of November, we had about 5 feet of snow and it was 40 below with a howling wind that made it feel like -60. Gardening in Zone 2 ends in August or early September, and we always had tomato plants hanging in the basement to ripen the crop. I know my family never went anywhere without the full survival kit in the trunk - snowshoes, sturdy tow rope, flares, road cones, thermal blankets, full car repair tools, sterno stove, chocolate, and radio beacon (this in the days before cel phones).

Bleh - this whole discussion is making me cold! Good thing I live in a no-snow zone now, even though it did hail like all fury yesterday.

[Charlie MV]

Alright Charlie, I HAD to find out what that 9 fingered people ref was ... And found a blog that quoted the passage from Deliverance by James Dickey. Is that it? It sounds like your kind of a novel.

Deliverance was filmed about 60 miles from here. Except for Burt Reynolds and the other guys in the boats, they used no actors at all.

That's one reason I want to leave this place but good gawd, these people are telling me that unless I can enroll in a first grade class, I wont survive the first five minutes of the first winter.

I guess I'll stay here. At least I know which woods to stay away from.

FWIW, James Dickey taught part time at the University of South Carolina.

[stella1751]

OK, Stella, you've managed to remind me quite acutely of why I moved to the tropics - here, snow is something I can look at from afar, and cold is 40F.

I'm originally from Northern Alberta, whence your famed "Alberta Clippers" - we had extreme snow and extreme winds, and extreme cold. To answer Charlie's question from earlier, all northern Canadians are trained in avoidance and survival from the first day of elementary school - we learned what to do with hypothermia cases almost before we learned the times tables. It's part of the fall curriculum of all schools. We also learned how to survive if you do end up stranded for whatever reason - it's easier in the North where there's accumulated snow, because you can dig yourself into it. On the plains where the wind whips most of it away, it's much harder to survive exposure.

I recall years when at this time of November, we had about 5 feet of snow and it was 40 below with a howling wind that made it feel like -60. Gardening in Zone 2 ends in August or early September, and we always had tomato plants hanging in the basement to ripen the crop. I know my family never went anywhere without the full survival kit in the trunk - snowshoes, sturdy tow rope, flares, road cones, thermal blankets, full car repair tools, sterno stove, chocolate, and radio beacon (this in the days before cel phones).

Bleh - this whole discussion is making me cold! Good thing I live in a no-snow zone now, even though it did hail like all fury yesterday.

Ah. I forgot about the short, thick candle and cigarette lighter in a metal coffee can . When I was living in South Dakota, 15 miles from town, I always had one of those behind the back seat in my pickup. Supposedly, you can heat an entire pickup cab with one of those. (I never put it to the test.)

Yes, chocolate, but it never lasted

[tedln]

Stella,

A roll of toilet paper stuffed into a metal coffee can and saturated with rubbing alcohol always made a nice emergency heater for me. The blue flame burned low without a lot of noxious fumes for about three hours. When the alcohol was about gone, you put the lid on for a second and snuffed out the flame. Poured more alcohol in and lit it again.

Ted

[stella1751]

Ted, it's 9 degrees outside right now, and the heater is running like a banshee. Forecast lows for most of the upcoming week are in the single digits, with highs in the upper teens. I'm now eyeing my toilet paper with a thought to alternative energy. Who needs gas heat or even solar power when you have readily available Charmin?

[tedln]

Stella,

It works! Pour the alcohol until the can is about 1/2 full. Sit the can in a metal cake pan or deep fry pan so the pan will catch the alcohol if you spill it. Keep another pan handy that can be turned upside down over the first pan to extinguish the flame if you spill it. The toilet paper will act as a wick. I've never used them in my house and I'm not sure I would. I have used them in tents and under shelters where I could exit fast. You need to always be aware that it is an open flame and not sit anything else on fire. Rubbing alcohol is mostly water with some alcohol in it. When the alcohol burns away in the can, the paper is still damp with water and doesn't burn. You can hear the moisture popping a little as it turns to steam at the top of the paper roll. Most of the water evaporates as it burns with a low, blue flame.

If all your fire wood is wet, you can sit one under a grill out side and boil water over it for soup or tea or coffee. Works well.

I've also used two small hibachi's in my fireplace with charcoal to help heat the house and cook over when we lost power for a week during an ice storm. All the fumes and smoke went out the chimney, but the hibachi's radiated a little heat into the room.

I
Ted

[tomf]

Thoughts on Winter; it is cold.

[Kisal]

Where I live, it's mostly wet! We're supposed to have some snow over the next 2 days, though. I still haven't gotten managed to find time to cover the foundation vents around my house. That's probably how I'll spend this afternoon.

[stella1751]

Here's a thought on winter: I hate it! It's -1 outside right now. The forecast high for today is 9. While outside this morning, I heard a loud cracking noise come from my car. I'm betting that pit in my windshield is in the process of cracking. If so, I am hoping all that snow on it doesn't cause the windshield to cave in. Grrrr

I suppose this is why Casper is ranked in the top five worst winter cities by the Old Farmer's Almanac.

[pondlady]

It is a necessary EVIL!

[tomf]

Lorex in the Boston area and we had simular training, although way up north it is much colder.

My parents had a house on a lake in NH, it was our week end retreat. I was friends with all the locals and in the winter if the ice was blown clear of snow we would drive down the boat ramps and go for a spin on the ice.

[stella1751]

My parents had a house on a lake in NH, it was our week end retreat. I was friends with all the locals and in the winter if the ice was blown clear of snow we would drive down the boat ramps and go for a spin on the ice.

We lived on a lake in Northern Idaho when I was a child. I was the fifth of six daughters, with the older ones all in high school and, I suppose, real babes. The local boys would drive their muscle cars out onto the lake and do cookies in front of the house. Dad would stand at the window, glaring down at them and muttering, "It'll serve 'em right if they go through the ice."

[DoubleDogFarm]

doughnuts.

[Charlie MV]

We're anchored in 150 feet of water. It's 50 degrees heading for 40. We're watching NCIS on the DVR. It will be 60 degrees tomorrow. This situation makes some people nervous. particularly being anchored in deep water. But I gotta say highs of 9 degrees and lows below zero scare me to death.


I'll sleep like a baby tonight. It's blowing, we're rocking, happy happy joy joy.

[tedln]

Cuz Charlie,

I truly envy you. Nothing like rocking yourself to sleep on a rocking boat anchored away from all the hub-bub and noise. We are in a motel room in East Texas getting ready to pull our ATV out to the forest and ride all day. It is about 35 degrees outside. We will be all bundled up like kids getting ready to ride a slide down a snowy hill. This is what I enjoy. I hope you and my other cuz's had a very nice Thanksgiving.



Cuz Ted

[tomf]

We get some nasty winter storms and some times we loose power, we lost it for a over a week one year as a bunch of trees fell across the wires. Our road has underground utilities but a ways down the road they are on poles. I have even had to chainsaw my way out to the road.
This winter we decided to install a generator. I made a shed for it and then ran wires. The wiring goes from the transfer box to the breakers. The system takes over individual breakers and their circuits. As you can see it is quite a wiring job I have about a day or so more wiring to do.

[img]https://i37.photobucket.com/albums/e57/twistedtomf/House/Gen.jpg[/img]

[img]https://i37.photobucket.com/albums/e57/twistedtomf/House/power2.jpg[/img]

[img]https://i37.photobucket.com/albums/e57/twistedtomf/House/wires1.jpg[/img]

A second breaker box I had to run wires to.



[img]https://i37.photobucket.com/albums/e57/twistedtomf/House/_DSC0020.jpg[/img]

[tedln]

Tom,

I can't tell what size generator your installing. I have two Honda EU 2000i, units which can be operated in parallel. They do a good job and are very, very quite.

Did you install the double pole, double throw, switch to prevent your generator power from going up the utility line in case a crew is working on the line while your generator is running. Most utility companies require their installation when you install a backup generator. I love the neat way you wired it in.

A friend of mine just built a new house with a large safe room complete with supplies to last a month. He found a 15000 KW diesel powered gen set on Craigs List for $2500.00. It was in almost new condition. He built a safe room for the gen set and stored enough diesel to run the generator for one month.

Many people in Texas are preparing to fight a war when the violence spills over from Mexico. They want their families to have a safe place to stay when the fighting starts. I know that sounds crazy, but many people living along the border expect it to happen.

Ted

[tomf]

Ted it sounds like you are not to far from the border. It is crazy what is going on down there. The box that sits on top of the wall in the photo of the wiring is a transfer switch and it prevents sending power down the line.

[tedln]

The last time I installed a transfer switch, it alone cost around $350.00. Have they come down in price any? Were you lucky enough to find a used one?

I live far enough from the border that I am little effected by the problems. I have friends who live near the border and are greatly effected. Compute the fact that two cities, Juarez Mexico and El Paso Texas are separated only by a narrow little open sewer ditch called a river and a few border patrol agents. In Juarez the murder total for the year is 6000. In El Paso, the murder total for the year was 10; but it is quickly rising. The American citizens who live near the border feel as if they are living on the outskirts of Baghdad during the worst days of the war in Iraq and their government doesn't care and has no intention of protecting them.

Many people feel they must protect themselves from the insurgents crossing the Rio Grand fully armed and from the American authorities who will attempt to disarm the citizens but not the insurgents.

Ted

[tomf]

Ted when is the last time any thing came down in price? So no! All the wire I had to run cost close to that also. But I will get by fine this winter.

[Charlie MV]

Cuz, she has a 7.6 KW Onan generator that sounds like a Singer sewing machine.

[tedln]

Cuz, I like the Onan units. I used to have a slide in camper in the back of a pickup truck. It had a 3 KW generac built in. Sometimes in the hot summer, the wife and I would go to bed with the air conditioner running. In the morning, someone would sometimes come to our camper and complain about the noise of the generator. It was really pretty quite, but I thought I would upgrade to a new Onan they had just started marketing which was supposed to be really, really quite. I ran one at an RV dealership and it was much louder than the Generac I already had. I kept the Generac and started camping farther away from other people.

I'm still scratching my head about the Honeywell genset Tom is installing. I know Honeywell makes great equipment, but I am not familiar with their generators.

I really like the little Honda and Yamaha units. I have two of the Honda 2000 units and they can be carried around like two little suitcases but they make enough power to run air conditioners.

Cuz Ted

[Charlie MV]

We have a Honda E something at home for power failures.

It got COLD here . High was 45 low tonight in the low 20s. Our marina lost a water main Friday. We're cruising a few miles for water. We left today on one engine [port engine has a problem and for now I only use it for docking.] got to the alt marina. Wind was whipping at about 30 mph. There was a boat where I needed to be to get water. I tried to use both engines to muscle her around and back down the other side.

We were in white caps and 4 footers and I just couldn't keep the bow into the wind while trying to make the swing to back in. Can't rev the port engine. I bailed and we headed for home....waterless. I mean dayum it was cold. We were broadside to the wind and it made a 40 foot 30,000 lb boat list 5 degrees.

When we made the turn to home it was into the head wind with a bit of a starboard quarter. Our eyes were watering. That doesn't happen much here. It took two passes to get her snugged back home waterless and on one engine. I wouldn't have thought twice about this all in warmer weather. I made the admiral put on a life jacket to deal with the lines. That's rare.

It was an exciting cold and waterless day. We're giving up and heading home tomorrow. Hope our marina has water by next weekend.

[tedln]

Yea Charlie, it got cold here last nigh also. I think the temp is currently 27 degrees. Only into the forties today. We always sleep with the heat turned off in the house with a sheet and light blanket pulled up. We keep a heavier blanket folded at the end of the bed. It got so cold last night, I was freezing so bad I didn't want to reach down and pull the warmer blanket up. The wife pulled it up sometime during the night. She said I looked like a bear hibernating for the winter, rolled up like a ball under the blanket.

How big is your fresh water holding tank? I would have thought 150 gallons on a boat that size because the weight is normally used as ballast. We have a 36 foot, fifth wheel trailer with 45 gallon fresh, gray, and black water tanks. 45 gallons of fresh will last us about one week with both of us taking showers every day. I'm surprised you ran out of water in a little more than one week.

Is your boat single screw or double screw? If it is double screw, I can understand the problems you were having steering into and across the wind. Your boat becomes more like a sail or kite when powering against the wind. I wouldn't even want to anchor in that kind of wind even if both engines were working and I had plenty of water.

I hope you make it home okay on the single engine.

Ted

[Charlie MV]

Cuz, she's twin 454s. Maneuvering in tight quarters is what she and I do best. I just couldn't run the port engine for long and I couldn't throttle up enough to muscle around with the wind to our bow.

Tank-age is about 100 gallons fresh and 100 black water. Gray water goes in the lake. That's dish water and other sink water for the environmentalists.

We can shower twice and do two days worth of face and dish washing. Of course it's a navy shower. Turn on the water, turn it off, lather up, turn on water to rinse. So we basically make 2 and a half days on a hundred gallons and in the navy I was taught to never skip showers. Boats are close quarters

We made it back to the home marina . I love boating in adverse conditions like high wind and waves. I don't much like that combination in very cold weather. We run strictly at night in the summer because of the heat. Winter is our busiest cruising time because it's usually 55 or 60 and just perfect for a sweater.

The admiral confessed that when I tried to swing and back down on the gas dock yesterday it scared her. I aborted without her saying a word but 4 footers and whitecaps are intimidating while backing down on a twin engine boat with one of them being lame.