Today’s my brother’s birthday. He’s, let’s see, let me do the math here…. He’s old. A lot older than I am, so that makes him really old. Also, if you’re bored, looking for something to do tonight, and happen to live within 50 miles of the State Theatre in Ithaca, NY, you should go and see a young man by the name of Marc Maron. I understand he’s quite a funny fellow. Also appearing will be Eugene Mirman, and Kurt Braunohler. I guess with a name like “brown holer” your career choices are pretty much either comedian or mass murderer. At least if you attended any of the schools I did, growing up.

Sadly, I live about 53 miles from the State Theatre, and therefore will not be attending (which is pretty shameful, considering how I once upon a time whined that Maron would never come near Central NY, but, well, money is tight, and I feel bad that I haven’t listened to WTF in a long time, being forced to give it up as one of those luxuries I can no longer afford – on the bright side, by not going to something I wasn’t going to go to anyway, I saved more than enough money to order a Jawstand that will quite nicely complement my Jawhorse). And, well, Maron and I really aren’t as close as we used to be anyway.

There was a time we’d sit and chat over coffee pretty much every weekday morning (oh, sure, they were kind of one-sided conversations, and I always got the feeling he never really heard what I was saying, but, what the hell, being married I’ve gotten used to that sorta thing). Alas, those days are long gone. More than five years gone, if you can believe it. And then he started referring to people as “his stalkers,” and I don’t want to make him nervous or uncomfortable or anything and I’m really not the type to bring cookies (though if I thought I could get away with it, I’d stuff a cat or two in his backpack while he wasn’t looking).

Just ‘cuz I’m not going tonight doesn’t mean you shouldn’t, though (or your brother, if he happens to live in Ithaca – not mine; he lives in Florida). I advise you to get there early, too, since it’s going to be very warm today (already 50’ish), and even at this time of year with the trees naked of leaves, it’s a beautiful area. “Ithaca is gorges” as they say, and it’s a nice little commie/socialist enclave that everybody should feel welcome at.

I mean, people like Rod Serling taught at Ithaca College (which houses the Rod Serling archives and is home to the annual Rod Serling Conference), and of course we all know that Cornell turned out such wild-eyed radicals as Keith Olbermann, Kurt Vonnegut, Bill Maher, and Ruth Bader Ginsburg (Ann Coulter and Paul Wolfowitz, too, I’m sorry to say – but the dark side is just too strong in some people).

I must warn you, however, that, what with the weekend coming and all, today’s warm weather is supposed to turn to shit at some point overnight, with cold air from Canada (stupid Canadians) smacking into the warm air and leading to fierce winds and snow. So watch out you don’t get caught in some shitty weather.

Still, spring was nice while it lasted, and I’m just grateful that I was able to spend most of it sitting at a desk in a windowless office.

Speaking of which, time to get going.

It was nice to read about Stan Musial’s day in DC, so thanks for that, Vernon. Of course, Stan last played shortly before my third birthday, so I don’t really remember him as a player. But then, I was never really much of a baseball fan – more so when I was kid, I guess. I think that was because back then, they played the World Series during the day, during the week (some of the games, anyway, if not all of them), so if you wanted to watch, you’d have to call in sick to work or play hooky from school. Otherwise, you went around with a earphone and a pocket transistor radio. In other words, the World Series was something special – even if you weren’t really a fan. Now? Well, not some much. As with most all professional sports (except maybe the NHL), it’s pretty much just rich, spoiled mercenaries pumped with horse drugs. Used to be the trade of a player was big news – and a strike or a lockout unthinkable. But once you get all this money involved, well, it takes a lot of the fun out of things. It’s all George Steinbrenner’s fault.

Around here, our spirits are high. Yesterday was warm – it actually hit 40 or so – and today they’re promising pert near 50, so we’re definitely feeling as if maybe – just maybe – winter will end one of these days. Of course, in an average year, we get another 40 inches of snow from here on out, and anybody who’s been around for a while knows we’re not quite done yet. Still, anything we get now can’t last more than a couple of months, so while we may not be in the final stretch, we’re at least rounding the last turn.

Of course that means I have to start thinking about all the work that needs to get done once the snow’s gone. I don’t mind the work – just wish I had more time and money. Damn school taxes’ll be due before you know it.

Speaking of old-time athletes, Happy 75th Birthday to the greatest football and lacrosse (pretty good hoops, and not too shabby at the high jump, discus, and javelin toss as a decathlete, and even threw a bunch of no-hitters as a high school pitcher) player of all time (if you don’t believe me, just ask him, he’ll tell ya so himself), and fellow SU alum Jim Brown. Some minor athlete has a birthday today, too. Jurdan? Giordan? Something like that. I think he played minor league baseball, and a little hoops, too. Oh, and HFB to Hal Holbrook as well. He was the guy that blew the whistle on Nixon.

The guys on the lo-cal news this morning are wearing pink (the kinda cute female talking head with the really good porn star name — who they dumped the pleasant but goonie-faced broad for when they went to hi-def because I guess they figured it was too early in the morning to look at her in HD — isn’t wearing pink, though, so maybe she didn’t get the memo). Is this some sort of pink holiday that I’m unaware of? Not that I have any pink apparel, assuming you discount the socks and underwear that snuck in the wash with my red sweatpants. I think they’re long gone, though (as are the sweats, ‘cuz my wife kept making fun of them – actually, the real reason is I think they finally disintegrated; had them for a few decades). There was some sort of red holiday the other day, too. Something to do with the heart association, I think, where I was supposed to wear red and have my picture taken at work, for which I would receive a stupid pin.

Of course, I neither wore red (my eyes were a bit red) nor deigned to have my picture taken, but had a pin foisted upon me nonetheless (where it will sit on my desk until such time as it falls behind something and is forever lost. I’m really not much for group participation, which is why I’ve opted out of the “dollars for denim” scheme (it started out as “jingle for jeans”) somebody or other came up with, where you pay $10 a month for the privilege of wearing dungarees on Friday. I prefer to keep my charitable donations to myself, and my dungarees are working clothes, not suitable for the office.

It never ceases to amaze me how much time and effort people put in to all this bullshit. Every pissant holiday and cause, somebody’s coming around with their hands out for money. Donations, raffle tickets, overpriced candy bars, popcorn & cookies – you name it. Frankly, I have shit to do at work, and would just as soon be left the f*ck alone to do it.

We also have “walkers” where I work. One woman in particular (not sure where she works; not in my office) appears to get paid to walk briskly about the building (around the building in warm weather), huffing and puffing, swinging her arms dramatically with her headphones on and a stupid f*cking look on her face. I really shouldn’t care, but for some reason the sight of her bugs me, and whenever I see her, I have to resist the urge to punch her in the face. Now, if somebody wants to sell tickets for a buck a whack, that I might go for. Not that she’s huge or anything, but for all the f*cking walking she does, she ought to pretty skinny, but it appears that in between laps around the building, she’s eating donuts or something.

Speaking of the lo-cal news, I think they’ve reviewed their demographics, and have now decided to be the “news for morons” leader in the area. First, the weather dork tells us that the weather satellite is “a big fancy camera in space that takes pictures of clouds” then the financial planner dude’s tip is that “retiring early will affect your social security,” in an interview regarding a guilty plea in a murder case, the DA says that “if the evidence hadn’t been there, he wouldn’t have plead guilty,” the porn star chick informs us that “potholes can damage your car,” and then, not to be outdone, the weather dork comes back with, “the satellite picture shows clouds, and the radar image shows rain and snow – which we call ‘pre-cip-i-tation.’ ” Can you say that? Sure. I knew you could.

WTF, did I go to bed in NY last night, and wake up in Mississippi?

Speaking of news, I guess Lara Logan got pretty brutally attacked over there by the freedom lovers trying to bring democracy (or at least martial law – and thank goodness for the military, who, along with a group of women, managed to save her before she was ripped to pieces) to Egypt. CBS News has issued a statement saying that they’ll make no more statements, and they hope everyone will respect her privacy. Which of course everybody should, but you can rest assured CBS wouldn’t respect anybody else’s privacy, and would have people camped out on her doorstep ready to shout questions and ask her how it made her feel to get brutally attacked, with teevee doctors speculating over what her injuries and prognosis might be, and in general making her life even more miserable than it no doubt is at the moment until she agreed to do an “exclusive” on one of the idiot morning shows.

It’s supposed to be warm today, even warmer tomorrow, and even, even warmer on Friday (colder for the weekend, or course). That’s all I need is a little glimpse of spring to cheer me up and recharge my batteries. And give me a chance to fix my busted tire chain (had to pull them both off until I figure something out – much smoother ride, I must say, but it could make moving snow a little tougher).

Oh well, I think I hear the sound of Granny draining the coffee pot (and not making more; see how she is?), so I guess I’d better get to work on fixing another one.

32 days, 13 hours ’til spring!

I missed it yesterday, but I guess the Today Show had George (the first) Bush and his, um “lovely” wife Bar on for Valentines’s Day. Because, when you think of love, hugs, kisses, sweetness, and light, you think of Barbara Bush. Right? Although I couldn’t bring myself to watch the replay, in looking at the photo, I must say that George finally looks old enough to be married to Barb. Well, good for them – I’m glad they’re so gosh darn happy. I mean, look at what happiness they’ve managed to set forth upon the planet in their 100 years of marriage.

Not all of yesterday’s news was of the touchy-feely kind, of course. Mostly there was Obama’s budget and the knee-jerk reaction to it by the Republicans. I can’t quite force myself to look at any of it. I guess they’ve finally worn me down, and now I just want them to al shut up and go away. I’m screwed no matter what, so just let me go to my job and die inside (and out, come to think of it) a little more every day.

Going to work really shouldn’t fill me with so much despair, but it does. And it takes more than Monday to get over it. By Wednesday night it isn’t too bad as long as I try not to think about it, but then Thursday I start to think about how short the weekend is.

And they keep flaunting these lottery commercials in my face. 🙁

Oh well, I hope it didn’t snow enough to plow the driveway last night, ‘cuz goddamn it, I’m not gonna do it. For one thing, I’d need to struggle with either putting the chains on one tire, or taking them off the other, and for another thing it’s f*cking cold out (again). Mid forties yesterday, single digits today. The only time I see daylight is on the ride in and the ride home (which of course is better than it was a few weeks ago, where, if I wanted daylight, I had to look at a webcam).

I hope you all made it through President’s Day OK. Seems as if a lot of people went on vacation. After a very cold and snowy Saturday, yesterday turned out pretty warm (after starting out cold and snowy), and I was able to widen out the driveway (though one of my snow chains broke or something; as I was about done, I just pulled it off and will have a look as soon as the time is the most inconvenient). I also skipped getting diesel. Again, I think I’ll wait until I desperately need some. I did manage to make some progress on my desk though. Having decided to go with porcelain tiles for the top, I bought a bunch and got them cut and laid out. Now I just need to get them all laid (me too), grouted, etc. Unfortunately there isn’t enough light in the room, so it’ll have to wait for next weekend (or I suppose I could put a lamp in there or something).

Once again, I missed out on the Grammys. Didn’t know they were coming up, didn’t care, and haven’t even heard of most of the people who won or were nominated. I’ll try and listen to this Arcade Fire, I guess. Seeing as they’re an indie band, maybe the don’t suck. But I have no idea.

Sounds like that liberal President is up to it again:

President Barack Obama, less than two months after signing tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans into law, is poised to propose a budget to congress that attacks programs that assist the working poor, help the needy heat their homes, expand access to graduate-level education and undermine that type of community-based organizations that gave the president his start in Chicago.

Obama is expected to propose cutting deficits by roughly a trillion dollars over the next decade — or roughly $100 billion each year — by squeezing social programs. A deal struck to extend the Bush tax cuts for just two years, meanwhile, increased the deficit by $858 billion dollars. More than $500 billion of that bargain constituted tax cuts, with billions more funding business tax breaks and a reduction in the estate tax.

But, hey, did you hear there’s democracy in Egypt? I mean, sure, right now it kind of looks a lot like a South American coup, with the military taking control, dissolving Parliament, and suspending the Constitution, but, they promise it’s all gonna be OK in the end.

I just hope their democracy winds up looking more like democracy, than our liberal President looks like a liberal President.

Oh, almost forgot, Happy Valentine’s Day. It’s right up there with the Grammys in terms of importance to me.

Lots to do this weekend. For one thing, I’ve been a bit lax in doing my laundry, and have gotten down to some of the oldest underwear I own. The kind where the elastic band sounds like crinkling cellophane. On the bright side, the old stuff actually fits, so that’s cool. Then there’s my hair. It was getting all in my face and unruly and annoying, so I gave it a “bobbit” (that’s where I take everything that’s sicking out, and cut it off), which works out OK in the front and the sides, but not so much in the back, which I left alone, and now I have this Joe Dirt mullet kinda thing going on in back, and a Bettie Page thing going on in the front (which I frankly don’t have the body to pull off), and it looks pretty stupid. So today I’ve gotta deal with that stuff back there. That’s right, I’ve gotta give myself a reach around. There’s also some snow to deal with (a barn just a hop and a skip – not even a jump – from us caved in last night and a guy not too far away went through the roof of his barn, plunging three stories to his death; we have a lot of barns up this-a-way), I still have a dual-flush converter to install, a desk to finish, and, of course, the dogs need to be pleasured. Plus a lot more. And now the weekend’s half over. Damn. I feel defeated already, and it’s not even 5 AM.

On the bright side, I’m really learning to love the smell of Ben Gay (though it seem like they also ought to make a Ben Straight, just to be fair and balanced), and Egypt is “free.” I’m glad they’re free, of course, and I hope the poor folks over there get a break (goodness knows the poor folks over here are screwed, with the Republicans proposing massive cuts to domestic programs with not a penny to be cut from the #1 budget item, “defense”).

I also have a selfish reason for hoping this stuff is all over in Egypt: I’m tired of hearing the “man in the street” interviews with the protesters. No offense, but it would be nice if those people would use their inside voices once in a while (and talk a little slower). I keep waiting for one of them to yell, “NO SOUP FOR YOU!”

Anyhow, Allah bless you all, and good luck. I hope that military guy from the Indiana Jones movies who’s in charge now turns out to be a good dude. Just remember, if it comes down to it, don’t bring a scimitar to a gun fight.

Add Wisconsin to the list of places I’m glad I don’t live. I’m sure you’ve all seen where its new Governor wants to strip its State employees of their rights to collective bargaining and is preemptively threatening to use the National Guard to knock heads in case there’s trouble. I’m sure he’s also the first (OK, second, behind John Boehner) to shed joyous tears for the great Egyptian revolution toward democracy. A shame we can’t count on the US military to back the people over the government. Not saying theywouldn’t – just saying I wouldn’t count on it.

Too bad, too, ‘cuz then we’d have an armada of heavily armed unmanned Reapers at our disposal here in Syracuse. I’d dispatch them to Albany and have them circle Andy Cuomo and the rest of the NYS legislature ominously. Andy’s latest scheme (being touted a “brilliant” by many) is to have the legislature pass a budget with no specifics. Then he’ll decide what to cut. So there will be no actual chance for citizens to lobby their – and I use the term loosely – representatives to preserve funding for, oh, jobs, hospitals, schools, snow plows, prisons, copy, fire fighters…. You know, all that piddly stuff that the rich people on Wall St can’t be bothered to pay for (even though their always first in line for services, and loudest to squawk when they don’t get their way).

Oh well. As soon as it gets warm again, we should so get permits and have an organized Saturday protest, with clever signs and lots of speechifying. I won’t be able to make it, of course, ‘cuz I only get two days off and I can’t leave the dogs. But I’ll watch some of it on CSPAN and totally disagree with the crowd estimates.

Hell, it got us out of Iraq, so it’s just got to work.

Update: Yesterday was supposed to be warm and relatively snow-free. Bullshit.

I was at a red light yesterday morning, sitting behind a car with a bumper sticker that read “These Colors Don’t Run.” I kind of symbolically rolled my eyes but then gave it a closer look, because it wan’t on a Hummer or a Ford F-150 with a gun rack, but instead on some little Earth-muffin car plastered with a bunch of lefty-type bumper stickers (one thing the lefties have in common with the Jesus people – they love them some bumper stickers; back in my day, we mostly just used ’em – the stickers, not the lefties – to cover up the holes and hold the fenders together), and I saw that there was an additional line that read, “The World.” So I thought that was pretty good. Of course, whether you’d like that sentiment to really apply all depends on who’s President, and what the circumstances are.

For instance, right now, there are a lot of people who think Obama should be running Egypt (hell, he’s the right color for it – kind of a “Sadat Brown” – and he’s one of them, being an undercover A-rab mooslam from Kenya and all) – or at least loudly and publicly dictating terms to Egypt as to who ought to be running their show. Personally, I’m not exactly sure what Obama ought to be doing – I only know what he is doing (assuming he’s actually doing something) isn’t enough.

He should forcefully and unequivocally tell Murbarak that he has to leave the country or we’ll be engaging in a little regime change. Except that might turn out to be kinda messy, and not everybody around the world is overjoyed at us sticking our noses into other people’s business (not that we haven’t been all along, of course). I mean, I wasn’t too crazy about Bush, but if Belgium had come along and told him he had to resign, I’d have told Belgium to go Cheney themselves.

We could refuse to trade with Egypt until there’s a new, democratically-elected government (assuming it’s not the Muslim Brotherhood or somebody else that we don’t approve of – probably we ought to give them a list of our terms and who would be acceptable. Let’s face it, them brown people really can’t be trusted to do the right thing; it’s not their fault, there’s an awful lot of sun over there – kinda like Texas – and it tends to addle your brain. And don’t give me this crap about they built the pyramids, either, ‘cuz everybody knows that was space aliens).

But, being winter and all, it might not be a good time to upset the apple cart, seeing as Egypt’s #1 export to the US is natural gas and then there’s the whole oil thing (we really should have gotten off oil during President Carter’s second term, but, well, that didn’t quite work out), and also it’s not really a great time – economically speaking – to stop selling shit to anybody that’s willing to buy it from us (I mean, fercrissakes, we can only use so much ethanol and high fructose corn syrup, so what the hell would we do with all that corn that Egypt takes off our hands?).

Then again, we provide a lot of military shit to Egypt as compensation for them not being mean to Israel, so we could cut that off. Except the military – so far, anyway – seems to be standing behind the people (or at least not running them over with tanks, the way some of our other trading partners might do).

And, speaking of Israel, don’t forget we’re Constitutionally bound to kiss their asses (I think it’s the 28th Amendment) and they aren’t too crazy about this whole “democracy” thing over there in Egypt. All they know is Murbarak has been deep in our pocket all these years, and it’s tough to stage an attack on Israel from that particular vantage point (about the worst they could do is kick Uncle Sam in the nuts trying to crawl their way out).

And then of course there’s the affect that a “people’s” revolt in Egypt might have on other places in that region. Like, say, Syria, whose government might decide they need to do something to stem the rising tide of revolution. And what better way to distract “the people” than to start some shit with Israel? I mean, Israel’s pretty easy to provoke (hell, all you need to do is send some humanitarian aid to Palestine), and who (over there, at least) doesn’t hate Israel?

So, anyhow, I don’t know what he ought to do, but whatever it is Obama is (or isn’t) doing (publicly or privately), I know it’s not the right thing.

It would be a lot easier to trust in him, had he not sold out on every major campaign promise and pretty much on every issue of major importance (and by that I of course mean of major importance to me) in his two years in office (holy crap! Has he only been in for two years – does it seem like a lot longer, or is it just me?). But, unlike his treatment from the teabaggers and wingnuts, he’s pretty much earned the distain of the left – even if a lot of it may stem from unreasonable expectations of some (too many years of teevee where the black dude is always cool – it’s the Cosby effect, I think, or maybe the “Lincoln Hayes” – have set us up; and of course the teabaggers have only been watching the shows where the black guy is the criminal).

To be fair, though, I haven’t really been paying close attention to all of this. More attention than I paid to the Super Bowl, but not a whole lot more. I know I should care, because it’s all about democracy and the people rising up to oust a dictator (even though he’s our dictator) and we’ll never see that in this country – mostly because a minimum of 30% of the people here would march in lock step with a rightwing dictator, and no matter how poor they are, would demand tax cuts for the wealthy.

Why is it the mouthbreathing masses are so supportive of tax cuts for rich people (presumably on the .000008% chance that they’ll win the lottery), while clamoring for cuts to programs that might actually help them out should they much more likely become one of the 1% of Americans who will experience homelessness this year, or the 14% of American who will live in poverty? Oh, yeah, that’s right. Because they’re fat, stupid, and lazy.

I think that’s the basis for Larry the Cable Guy’s show on the History Channel.

But, anyhow, as for Egypt, the last time the young folks over in that part of the world rose up to overthrow one of our dictators, they wound up with the Ayatollah, and I’m not sure that’s what they had in mind. But, hey, it was better than living under the thumb of a US controlled despot.

Which I guess is where “these colors don’t run the world” comes in.

I was pretty surprised to hear that Chris Lee resigned so fast. I thought only Democrats had to resign over sex scandals. Of course, this wasn’t really a sex scandal – it was more being a lame embarrassment scandal. Not that being a lame embarrassment is unique, either. Of course, Chris is over there in Western NY, and play by different rules.

Here in Central NY, it’s all about the snow. In my neck of the woods, we dodged the Lake Effect snow bullet (on the radar, it looks more like a snow torpedo). I guess I won’t complain about what we get here, as it started snowing about 3-4 inches an hour last night, and some folks in what we all call the “North Country” are waking up to two feet more snow than they went to bed with – and it’s still falling. Damn cold, too. Up in Redfield, NY, the 23″ they’ve gotten since midnight brings them up to 251″ so far this season, but they have some more work to do to beat their record of 420″ (that’s, what 35 FEET of snow?). Of course, they don’t have a whole lot of street corners to cross up there in Redfield, like the typical Syracuse street corner pictured over there on the right. Makes getting around a little bit of a challenge.

Syracuse is within striking distance of a record this year, though. So far, they’re up to something like 138.5″ of snow, and, in a typical winter, we’ve gotten about 62% or our seasonal snowfall at this point. At that rate, that would put us up around 190 inches which, sadly, would fall short of a record (it would be good for #3 on the list, though). Of course, what we really want to do is hit the 200″ mark, which we’ve never done, and which would surpass the 199″ record that Buffalo set years ago. Buffalo – which gets all the publicity, yet averages a pathetic 67.8″ (slightly more than half what Syracuse averages) – having the NYS record for cities over 100,000 people is something we find shameful here. Or, I find it shameful (not quite as shameful as taking shirtless photos of yourself to send to women on Craig’s List, but shameful none the less), at least.

The record pursuit is on hold for now, however as it looks like we’re not supposed to get any appreciable snow here until maybe Saturday, when temperatures are expected to hit the big three-oh. That should be nice (the warmth, not the snow). My big fear at this point (aside from a roof collapse) is that the snow will just pile up until we get a five-day stretch of monsoon rains and 42 degree temperatures. Then I can start worrying about the sump pumps. Ideally, we’ll get some stretches of sunny, breezy, 35 or so degree days. That would get rid of some of this stuff with a minimum of flooding.

Speaking of cold and winter and whatnot, if you happen to be old and poor, President Obama has a big “F*ck You” in store for ya, as his proposed budget appears to include cuts for energy assistance. This is right there in line with his Republican pals in the House, who also want to cut, well, pretty much everything (except for assistance to the wealthy, which they of course want to keep). Nice to know the President and John Boehner (and Andy Cuomo) are on the same page – as usual.

Oh, damn, I forgot I’m not supposed to look at the news. Now I’m all agitated. But I’ve used up the weather, and of course we shall not, under any circumstances, discuss last night’s basketball game.

So I guess I better just drink more coffee, and prepare for my trip to the dentist.

I must be turning into a wimp, because, by the time I got done with plowing the driveway last night, I was so cold, it hurt. It wasn’t the coldest it’s been all year temperature-wise (about 10° or so while I was out there – a balmy 2° right now according to the news. I can’t give the reading from my back yard – which is likely colder – because my wireless temperature thingie is buried under several feet of snow and has gone into hibernation), but the wind was fierce, and I didn’t really get warm again until I was in bed and under the electric blanket for a few hours. There’s just no place to put the snow now. And tonight, it’s gonna get really cold. Normally, I’d wish I had tickets to tonight’s SU-Georgetown game, I think I’ll be happy to watch from the comfort of my own home (listening for the telltale sounds of roof truss failure). Sure do wish I could just go back to bed.

I succumbed to the media-induced paranoia yesterday, worried incessantly about roof-collapse all the way into work, and more or less turned around and came back home, spending the day trying to reduce the snow load. I didn’t come close to clearing it all (if you look at the roof, you’d think I put a fairly good dent in it, but if you look at the massive pile of snow on the ground across the back of the house – a good four feet high and three feet wide – that the dogs now have to traverse to get out and take a crap – you’d have a better appreciation for how much came down, and how much more there is to go), but am pretty confident that I at least reduced the snow load by about 10 tons or so. Maybe more (I hope).

There was easily an average of 3 feet of snow up there (probably more – there was no point less than 2 feet), with upwards of 5 or 6 feet in most spots). I mean, even give the pitch of the roof, it was way over my head in spots. And it was all very heavy, very wet, and very packed snow. I did the math as I was shoveling (in between trying not to slide off), and at even a moisture content of 10%, I figured a minimum of 62,000 pounds. At 30% (which is probably more likely), you’re up over 90 tons of snow.

Homes around here are supposed to be engineered to 55 pounds per square foot, so we’re pushing the limits here (even if it was actually engineered and built properly, and who the hell knows about that?).

In an effort to try and forestall a heart attack, I kept my self on a strict three-shovel break schedule. That is, I brought three shovels up on the roof with me, and after I dropped the third on over the edge, it was time for a break. Unfortunately, I got pretty good at not losing them, and spend a good 7 hours or more shoveling. And man, does all my shit hurt this morning.

When I finally just couldn’t take it any more, I did a walkthrough of the attic, and didn’t see anything that looked broken, twisted, stressed, or leaky, so I hope the roof will remain intact for now. More snow coming today, and the return of high winds and temperatures in the single digits. I’m now looking at building ramps so I can drive the tractor up there. Hell, what’s another 3,000 pound, give or take?

Anyhow, as regards winter, cold, and snow, I hereby officially declare myself a wimp. I give up – is that what you’ve been waiting for me to say, Mother Nature? Fine, I concede, surrender, cry “uncle” or whatever you want from me. I’m getting too goddamn old for this.

Can we please have spring now?