February 26
Kari thinks this is the longest stretch of cold weather we have had to endure, at least this winter and I think she is right. When it comes to overnight lows, I can’t think of any other stretch where the temperature dropped into the teens or single digits for going on five days. The temperatures are supposed to be in the 70’s some days next week so maybe relief is on the way.
We enjoyed a nice symphony concert last night. It featured Fei-Fei Dong on the piano playing Leroy Anderson’s Piano Concerto in C Major. Old Fei-Fei knocked it out of the park. We also got exposed one of the three finalists for music director/conductor, Stilian Kirov. He seemed competent in my limited knowledge. I wouldn’t object to him getting the nod, but I didn’t have any problem with George Jackson who conducted the symphony last month. I was particularly entertained, even to the point of staying awake, by two of the percussionists; one on cymbals and the other on the base drum. Those guys had to stay awake and pay attention for long intervals of not playing their instruments. Particularly in the Rachmaninoff: Symphony No. 2 there were long stretches in the music where they were idle but then they had to come in and clash and thump on queue. Mostly it was just one clash and thump, but at the end of the piece they got to clash and thump with abandon, maybe half a dozen times. I don’t know how the conductor managed to wave his arms around nearly an hour non-stop. Mine would have fallen off after 10 minutes. The percussionists must have gone home well rested.
February 20
The weather was nice last Wednesday morning and I spent it at the Bluff, the first time in a month. I watered the garden, trying to get enough moisture in the ground for things to start growing when it begins to warm up. I had my chainsaw and I put it to work trimming mesquite limbs. It barely would cut and, at first, I couldn’t figure out why. The chain was new and should have gone through the wood like a hot knife through butter. After sitting in my pickup swigging coffee for a few minutes it occurred to me I had put the chain on backwards. Mind, I have been using these chainsaws for, what?, 15 years and never encountered this problem before, which means I had managed to put a new chain on correctly, a 50-50 proposition, at least four out of five times. It didn’t take much to reverse the chain and get the proper result and off I went.
There was a big snag left from a limb that had broken off. Previously I had cut the smaller limbs with a hand saw and disposed of them in the dumpster. No way was I going hand saw my way through the snag, which was a least ten inches in diameter, but once I corrected my chain error, I laid it on the grown in about a minute. I sawed off a number of limbs from mesquite close by and will, over time, whittle them down with a lopper or hand saw and dispose of them in the dumpster, the objective being to remove limbs that are an impediment to mowing and trimming.
The other day I was working at my desk and noticed our local hawk perched in one of the junipers in the back. That was Thursday which started out in the teens, and it was still cold as a stepmother’s kiss during the afternoon, but at least the sun had come out. Our hawk had a nice perch in the sun, and I was able to study it in detail, mostly. There was some foliage that obscured it partially. I’ve said before that I thought the hawk was a Cooper’s but having studied it more closely, it seems too small, even given that it was hunched down in its plumage like an old man in an overcoat and must therefore be a sharp-shinned hawk. Its legs weren’t visible, and I don’t know if I would be able to tell if its shins were sharp or not even if they were. Could be that if its shins were visible, it would be longer/taller and qualify as a Cooper’s.
February 8
Hard to believe
From the Epoch Times: Transportation Safety Administration confirmed it allows illegal aliens to use arrest warrants for ID when flying inside the US. What’s hard to believe; that the TSA allows this or that they cofirmed that they d0?
February 6
It’s unusual for it to snow continuously for more than 24 hours as it did Wednesday and Thursday. Now, the flakes were small so it didn’t pile up very fast, but we got probably more than four inches, maybe even the 4.4 inches the weather service gave as the official amount. My gauge only registered .09 but I think with the wind blowing like it was, the snow didn’t stack up to give me an accurate measure. I was happy to be a shut-in for those two days; gave me plenty of time to read On Desperate Ground, a book about the Korean war. I finally got out Friday to visit the grocery store and replenish my meagre stores.
All the robins in four counties must have gotten together and decided to come to SA for a crapping contest during the blizzard. My front porch is a filthy mess. So is the patio but I didn’t notice it until the snow melted Saturday. I’ve been letting the droppings dry so maybe I can just sweep them off. Sheesh!
Thursday was a fun day. My heater couldn’t get the room temperature above 65°. In the wee hours of Friday morning when it was around 0° outside it was 60° inside. First thing Friday morning I called the people that installed the new HVAC system last August and they got someone right out to find the problem. Didn’t take Gabe long to find a wire that was loose. It prevented the system from ramping up to a level that could overcome the cold. By 8:30 it was working as it should and I was grateful.
Bluff day has been snowed out the last three Wednesdays. Maybe I’ll be able to get out there this Wednesday, although it isn’t forecast to a be nice day. We’ll see.