When Snow Meets Building

Here is a fine example of what happens when now meets a building and isnt removed. Just up the road the ski resort got 13 feet of new snow over the last week.  The roof of this building, a few miles before that,  had about 5 feet of new snow and completely collapsed under its weight and that snow is now inside the building.

John Muir Trail Conditions

I got approval for my one month vacation time from work and got my reservation for a permit from the park service can’t beat that for a milestone birthday! Now I can only hope the weather starts to stabilize and the snow begins to melt.  Not that I want ski season to end but I really don’t like the idea of hiking in the snow for 200+ miles. 

Photo taken last weekend from 8500 feet elevation a few miles in front of where the JMT passes Eddison and Florence Lakes. 

Taxes, What are They Good For?

A couple of weeks ago we were  “Snowed In Again “

This time we know why.  I can totally sympathize with the folks back east a few weeks back when they didn’t get their roads plowed.  They paid their taxes, made it a priority, or at least pretended to so that their homes wouldn’t get taken by the government.  They paid their taxes faithfully and didn’t get their roads plowed.  Stuck.  Money is tight, I got that. 

Well, we just discovered why our little community of about 100 homes has been neglected year after year by the county roads dept when it comes to plowing the snow.  My husband hunted down the plow driver as he went past our community of about 150 full time residents and on to the next one up the road of about 50 full timers but whose homes are about 1000 sq feet larger than those in our 100 year old neighborhood.  He honked at him and stopped him and asked what the deal was.  The deal IS we are “low priority”.  That’s actually what he said.  I wonder what it takes to become higher priority? At least 4 TV stations have their broadcast towers in our community and without those being accessible for repairs a whole city of a half a million could be shut down from watching Survivor, the Biggest Looser, Hell’s Kitchen and all those “fine shows”. Riots could ensue if people in the city were denied their “right” to be a couch potato.  Trees drop like flies around here when it snows. It wouldn’t take much to reduce those towers to scrap metal.  I guess we might rank a little higher on their list for plowing if that happened.  Till then I guess we have to pray no one has a heart attack.  The ambulance couldn’t get in. 

First Days

First days of skiing!  You can’t beat a small crowd, sunshine and powder. Great ending to the Thanksgiving holiday. And…. The Vikings won!  It just doesn’t get better.

Survival Instinct (part 2)

Sometimes individuals just do stupid things.  Snowmen are no different.  They can have low levels of survival instinct just like humans.  Sometimes they spend hours at a time sunning themselves, standing right out in the open of a front yard.  The sun beating down on them.  Every minute melting away the layers of their exterior. Sometimes they just hang out in places that are hazardous to their survival.  Don’t ask me why but they seem to insist that they can conquer obstacles such as large pinecones dropping on them or trees shedding their massive amounts of snow right down on their heads.  Sometimes they just have to claim the road.

Snow Gods

The people with low survival instinct will soon be headed to our area in droves.  They come to pay homage to the snow god.  They will glide up and down on the ground in the hopes the god will notice them and that they will take a part of it with them when they leave.  Some of them will leave parts of themselves on the snow god. 

They will forget their chains, or never have tested the ones they purchased to see if they fit. They will drive way too fast for their driving abilities and the conditions and they will spin and crash and get stuck. They will travel roads they have never been on and not think twice of how much gas they have remaining in their vehicles.   All this makes for great entertainment up here.  We don’t need movie theatres for drama, we have it live. 

Changing Trails

Sometimes the wizard doesn’t have any answers.  I’m getting used to this.  And so we order yet another MRI for another part of the body in the hope of finding a needle in the haystack, another lesion; this one possibly residing in my spine.  Apparently if it’s there it will explain my symptoms.  I find myself praying it will show itself so I can move forward. It feels like I’ve been going round and round for the last year on a trail that’s just a loop.  I’m ready to find the fork in the trail.  Sometimes you just have to take another path. Speaking of trails, its supposed to snow at our elevation this weekend.  If I can get my back to feel better a couple hours of cross country skiing would be a great thing.

Let it Snow!

Ski season is just around the corner!  The resort can’t open fast enough.  The wonderful thing about being able to ski is it’s a skill that could actually save your life … much like swimming.  If you live in snow country it’s a way to get around if the car/truck can’t.  Transportation by human power.