First Snow

 On Friday we had our first heavy snow of the winter.  It snowed during the early evening and then turned to rain.  Then the wind picked up and it snowed all day Saturday.  Now it's Sunday and the very strong wind has been blowing the snow into the parking area.  The driveway (all 700' of it) looks clear as the wind blows it out.  Unfortunately, the west wind has blown the snow from the lawn into the parking area.  Now we have the usual drifts.  There really isn't much snow but it's enough to stop the truck.  The snow is nothing like the snow we used to get in the 70's but it's still a problem.

11:00 am  Dan came over from next door.  He uses one of our barn outlets to power the block heater in his tractor.  He keeps his tractor in our far shed so we run a cord across from the barn where I keep my tractors to his machine.  It has been unplugged since last winter so he wanted to know if it was ok to plug it in.  No need to ask but he did.  

11:30 am  So I plugged in the block heater on my David Brown.  I used to enjoy blowing snow but my enthusiasm is waning a little more every year.  Must be this old age creeping up.

2.30 pm  Here I am again.  The tractor started after being on the block heater for a few hours.  I pulled it out of the shed and let it warm up and check for power steering leaks.  The pump has been leaking for years and always left a trail of yellow drops in the snow every winter.  So I finally bought a rebuild kit for the power steering pump last fall and spent an afternoon rebuilding the pump.  None the less I wasn't sure how things would work in the cold but all went well.

I cleaned out the parking lot and drove the car down to the road.  Just as I expected our moronic snowplow driver inundated our entrance with ice that formed on the road.  Big 10" chunks so I couldn't get the Honda out without damage.  We had a wonderful plow driver for 40 years but after his retirement we have had a series of goofs whose only goal in life is to get the job done and move on.  Opps--on the soapbox again!

Dan said he would clean up the ice on the road with his bucket but when he got down to the road his fuel filters started restricting his fuel and he barely got back to the barn.  So I went back to my tractor (that was already warm) and went down and blew out the ice on both driveways.  I have to admit it was a cold experience.  I think the cold affects me more at 82 than it did when I was younger.