Tractor's Gonna Get A Workout

There's At Least Another Foot

All I know is that the snow is over my knees in most places where I did not previously shovel or plow. I just dug out the path to the barn one more time and it was another 9 or so inches filled in. That's the third time I've shoveled it, and once plowed it out with the tractor.

To add insult to injury two of my evergreen trees have lost branches in my driveway, and the evergreen in front of the house next door has lost a branch across my driveway as well. These are not little branches, but fairly substantial ones. I am confident the tractor can move them so I'm not too worried, but it certain means some extra effort here. The plowing and digging out is going to be bad enough, but add the tree branches and we have a real mess to deal with in the daylight tomorrow.

Thank heavens I have the tractor with the front end loader! I think even the truck with the plow in full working order would have a major challenge this time. The problem is getting the snow out of the way rather than just pushing it to the side. A snow blower would do well, but I don't have one, so tractor will have to do.

Actually, once I'm out there, the whole challenge becomes a bit of an intellectual exercise as well. It's kind of like putting a jigsaw puzzle together. Each piece of the clearing out effort has to be just so to work. I'm sure I can get the west side of the driveway cleared OK. I am not sure about the east side. The only advantage there is that most of the pushing is downhill, so if I can keep the amount of snow piled up in front of the loader, I should be able to push it away. We'll see.

Honestly, I haven't seen this much snow here in perhaps 10 years. And I honestly cannnot recall having two big storms...well three, actually, come one after another like this. Today, we were hit by the first storm coming from the west, and then the second one a few hours later, coming up along the coast from the south. The only blessing here was that, from what I saw, we did not get the high winds predicted. That has kept the snow from drifting too much.

Now, there is an ugly rumor that there may be another storm coming next week.

Please! Enough already. My jigsaw puzzle is nearly complete. Once it is, there are no more places to pile the darn stuff.

The horses have spent some time under the run in sheds and some time standing outside in the paddocks. I do know that the sound of cracking tree branches spooked them out of the barn when I fed them. So the theory that they would prefer to be outside where they can run away from danger instead of being locked in the barn may have some merit. It may be just as well. If something should happen to the barn itself, I'd be just as happy if they weren't inside.

There is reason to keep horses inside now and then, of course. And sometimes, they play the fools and stay outside when they really would be better off inside. But for tonight, I'm just as content to know they have the choice.

Meantime, as I watch the snow still coming down--although it seems to be tapering off at last, I will try to rest easily until daylight when I can see what's really happened out there. I just called my friend Stacie in South Jersey and her power is out, so I can add her to my list of worries.

Once again, let me say it--Bummer!