We had a white Christmas this year!
Comparing to the last couple of winters it is a 'real' snowy winter this winter of 2015 - 2016! And not even too much snow, only a little over a foot overall where a "normal" winter of old would be around 3 feet or more.
It isn't sticking but it's been snowing all day today, 01/06/2016.
Comparing to the last couple of winters it is a 'real' snowy winter this winter of 2015 - 2016! And not even too much snow, only a little over a foot overall where a "normal" winter of old would be around 3 feet or more.
It isn't sticking but it's been snowing all day today, 01/06/2016.
The last couple of years winters have been pretty lite in the overall snow department. It was 'officially' drought conditions in this area of the North West this past year. Not hardly any snow last winter, with an EXTREMELY dry spring and summer. This area of North Idaho had a fair share of the summer fires, in Bonners Ferry two fires of over 10,000 acres and those were small compared to the other regional fires of many thousands of acres like the fires in the general vicinity the Lake Ponderay and near the Washington and Montana state lines.
Above is a wintry scene looking out our driveway towards a neighbor property. And below is looking down the street towards the "4 corners" intersection.
It was not exactly the best Christmas this year:
I have a friend I've stayed in touch with off and on over the years, known her since 1978, and who doesn't have anything electronic, no cell phone, no computer, no Internet.
So what I've been doing is putting programs on DVD for her to watch, send her YouTube videos I think she'd like and I guess let her tip a toe in the Internet to see what there could be for her too see for the past few years. Her mother has been living with her since her divorce and moving to a new home. I had called to let her know that I would be pre-ordering season 6 of Downton Abbey for her for Christmas and to make sure she also hadn't preordered it through and add she may have seen someplace.
It was an unexpectedly sad call for me because she told me her mother had just days before passed away very suddenly and in a matter of a couple of days. Not only was the shock of her mother unexpectedly passing making her distraught, in the prior month and before her mother passed away, both of her longtime dogs had also unexpectedly and suddenly died, one dying in her arms.
Upset is I think, an understatement.
She told me she had become accustomed to her mom always being there, they'd watch and comment on TV shows together as well as other things. Now, her mom is gone and she doesn't know what to do. She said she felt lost, and very alone.
Last week I'd called to see how she's coming along, she had just gotten a new dog, a 4 month old Doxie mix pup and was remembering how difficult to train and deal with a puppy it is again after so many years.
For myself and Stacy, our biggest concern at the moment is our daughter Laura. She's always seemed to have a tough go at life, and not always of her own doing.
Two weeks before Christmas she called and said that during the procedure she'd had to remove a few uterine cysts had discovered a cancerous one.
VERY troubling news!
The 28th of December she had a procedure done to 'scrape away' the lining in the area of the cancer with the hopes to get the rest of the cancer cells.
She called today and said the results were not the best of news we'd all wanted to hear. Next Monday they will try again to get the cancer and we hope for the best but they also said they found a bit more cancer in the area and told her she's now stage 2 cancer.
At this point prognosis is unknown, she said she may have to have surgery and possibly Chemotherapy, but it is too early to say for certain.
Laura is very upset and concerned as are we.
At this point Laura is saying she's "ok" and not to come to where she lives but whenever she gives the word we'll be on our way, and hoping for the best.
And lastly daughter Sandy and her family flew to New York on Christmas Eve to New Year's Eve to spend time with her husbands family.
Not fun for them because the day after arriving and during that week both grand daughters were sick and according to Sandy, they spent most of the week vomiting and miserable. One grand daughter even spent a part of a day on the 26th at the Emergency Room getting fluids administered!
No, not the best of years the Christmas of 2015, we truly hope this new year will be a good one.
Till next time.
The following photos are from my Q500+ and taken last Sunday, 01/03/2016, from above our property. It was 16 F and I only flew a few minutes to run my batteries down a little but I was able to get some good photos and video clips.
While you can't tell from this altitude, I really like the quietness of the blanket of snow. It makes the land almost totally quiet, except for my tinnitus!, I love walking in the snow and the sounds that makes. I love how until it gets plowed you can't even hear the auto traffic on the road, we don't get a whole lot anyway, but we do get enough that I know it makes the rolling down the road very quiet.
The next photos are from ground level.
Below I took this photo before all the lights get turned off and come down. The County Courthouse has two of these short trees and both were decked out with lights, they looked very nice with the snow I think.
Even though there hasn't been 'a lot' of snow there has been enough in the area that it has been causing utility issues. While not locally, there was a story of the area news that since it has been so cold for over two weeks and the snow hasn't been falling off on it's own, one of the power companies was flying helicopters low along the power lines to blow the accumulating snow off the trees nearby and the lines themselves as in some areas the heavy snow is taking out the lines with overloaded trees. We did have a couple of evenings where the lights would flash and things not plugged into the battery backup boxes would have to be turned on again every few minutes, like the TV sound system, but that has been about it so far.
The big problem will remain to be should it still turn into last winter where pretty much every time it would snow a day or so later it would warm up and rain melting the snow and making a general mess of things.
We'd already had that happen in early December, it was cold, snowed several inches, then warmed into the 40s and 50s making it just like the spring "breakup" as it is called locally, when unpaved roads turn to mud and muck and even the paved roads with all the sand used for snow traction become muddy roads for several weeks. And it is still early enough that scenario could occur, but usually here the coldest weather is in early to mid January with often a week of at or below zero temps. We did have 3 mornings of ZERO last week, so we'll see.
It at first seemed that this winter would be yet a repeat of snow then rain and just cold, that was even predicted earlier as the forecast this "El Nino" winter.
Until yesterday it had been below ice freezing temps for over 2 weeks so that produced a more normal winter! We'll just have to see if our winter will last to late February or early March which is usually when things start warming up again.
Since my last post:
It has been a bit of time since my last post, many things have occurred, most notably was the terrorist action in San Bernardino, California, on December 2nd.
Very sad, as both Stacy and I worked for the Public Health department while we lived in San Bernardino County, just another section then the Environmental Health department that was attacked. I had my 25 year career and Stacy her almost 20 years working at our department.
While we didn't live in San Bernardino City itself we spent a lot of time in the general "civic center" area. During our time there our department headquarters was on Mill Street just down from Waterman Ave. and between Waterman and Tippicanoe, and not very far from the building where it all happened. The Public Health Department was and still is headquartered at 351 North Arrowhead just off 3rd street near the County Courthouse and all the main county offices.
If we needed our vehicles serviced, it was at the County Yards on 3rd Street and if we had to "10-19", return to the office, it was to 606 East Mill Street. While much of the career we worked out in the field, except for my years as a supervisor when I too worked out of the Mill street offices, our department was very entwined with that downtown San Bernardino area so we knew it very well after all those years.
It was not exactly the best Christmas this year:
I have a friend I've stayed in touch with off and on over the years, known her since 1978, and who doesn't have anything electronic, no cell phone, no computer, no Internet.
So what I've been doing is putting programs on DVD for her to watch, send her YouTube videos I think she'd like and I guess let her tip a toe in the Internet to see what there could be for her too see for the past few years. Her mother has been living with her since her divorce and moving to a new home. I had called to let her know that I would be pre-ordering season 6 of Downton Abbey for her for Christmas and to make sure she also hadn't preordered it through and add she may have seen someplace.
It was an unexpectedly sad call for me because she told me her mother had just days before passed away very suddenly and in a matter of a couple of days. Not only was the shock of her mother unexpectedly passing making her distraught, in the prior month and before her mother passed away, both of her longtime dogs had also unexpectedly and suddenly died, one dying in her arms.
Upset is I think, an understatement.
She told me she had become accustomed to her mom always being there, they'd watch and comment on TV shows together as well as other things. Now, her mom is gone and she doesn't know what to do. She said she felt lost, and very alone.
Last week I'd called to see how she's coming along, she had just gotten a new dog, a 4 month old Doxie mix pup and was remembering how difficult to train and deal with a puppy it is again after so many years.
For myself and Stacy, our biggest concern at the moment is our daughter Laura. She's always seemed to have a tough go at life, and not always of her own doing.
Two weeks before Christmas she called and said that during the procedure she'd had to remove a few uterine cysts had discovered a cancerous one.
VERY troubling news!
The 28th of December she had a procedure done to 'scrape away' the lining in the area of the cancer with the hopes to get the rest of the cancer cells.
She called today and said the results were not the best of news we'd all wanted to hear. Next Monday they will try again to get the cancer and we hope for the best but they also said they found a bit more cancer in the area and told her she's now stage 2 cancer.
At this point prognosis is unknown, she said she may have to have surgery and possibly Chemotherapy, but it is too early to say for certain.
Laura is very upset and concerned as are we.
At this point Laura is saying she's "ok" and not to come to where she lives but whenever she gives the word we'll be on our way, and hoping for the best.
And lastly daughter Sandy and her family flew to New York on Christmas Eve to New Year's Eve to spend time with her husbands family.
Not fun for them because the day after arriving and during that week both grand daughters were sick and according to Sandy, they spent most of the week vomiting and miserable. One grand daughter even spent a part of a day on the 26th at the Emergency Room getting fluids administered!
No, not the best of years the Christmas of 2015, we truly hope this new year will be a good one.
Till next time.
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