We awoke yesterday morning to a winter wonderland. It snowed heavily all through the day, adding to the five inches of snow received overnight. Everything was white, white, white; and still is.
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Here is the thing though, we have had our trip to share Christmas with my family. It took almost till Easter to have weather fair enough for a one day travel trip, and so Christmas and Easter celebrations were somewhat combined. Attila calls it Chreaster.
And the snow, well, it is Chreaster after all, one would expect a snow storm, wouldn’t one! Sleigh bells ringing, and bunny rabbits laying eggs, we are ticking all the boxes!
And of course it went down to -13C overnight, so we needed two firings in the masonry heater to keep comfortable. It is so much easier though, than the relentless -20C to -30c temperatures we endured all through December, January, February, and March.
We had a lovely visit with family on Sunday, hosted by my youngest sister. A roast beef dinner with all the trimmings was followed by homemade Chelsea rolls and Cherry Cheesecake; you can’t say better than that. We travelled to the area the night before and stayed overnight with my middle sister, her husband, and my Mom, and had a lovely visit. This autumn I am aiming at celebrating Christmas with the family in November, in hope that we can find at least one Sunday suitable for travel before Christmas.
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When the temperature is warm enough that we can leave the house overnight without using the electric heat, and driving is viable with clear roads and good visibility, it signals the end of our long, cold, dark winter!
Blue skies are coming our way! This week should bring temperatures above freezing, even at night.
Worldly Distractions
Weather
-13°C
Date: 6:00 AM EDT Wednesday 16 April 2014
Condition: Clear
Pressure: 102.7 kPa
Visibility: 16 km
Temperature: -13.1°C
Dewpoint: -14.0°C
Humidity: 93%
Wind: calm
Quote
“Eccentricity is not, as dull people would have us believe, a form of madness. It is often a kind of innocent pride, and the man of genius and the aristocrat are frequently regarded as eccentrics because genius and aristocrat are entirely unafraid of and uninfluenced by the opinions and vagaries of the crowd.”
Edith Sitwell
1887 – 1964
“Being in a room with people who have no imagination is like being in a room without oxygen.”
Maggie Turner, who would rather spend time alone than run with the “wrong” crowd of somebodies.
I agree with your quote, Maggie… imagination is so essential… I can’t imagine living without one. Sometimes when I get irritated with Paul, I just say “can’t you just IMAGINE how to do it???” but he just hasn’t got much of one… what a shame for him.
Maggie, it will soon be over. Really and truly. I think. Probably. Maybe. Even here, over 800 miles to the south, it was down to freezing and will be again tonight–after 80sF last week. What a year!
But spring will indeed come, sooner or later, for all of us. And then very soon thereafter, it will be hot!
Personally, I can deal with the cold and I can deal with the hot. What gets me is having both within the span of just a few days.
I think you may have enough imagination for two Bex, your home seems well oxygenated!
Wendy, I am putting a lot of faith in the probably-maybe line of thought! I agree with you that it is likely that we will move from winter-like weather into the middle of a heat wave!
What a year for North America and a lot of other areas on planet earth. I read recently that Asian pollution is causing severe weather, link below, and I am not surprised. I grew up with the concept of “spaceship earth”, and the longer I live the more obvious it becomes that we are all a part of the great circle of life.
http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2014/04/140414-asia-pollution-aerosols-atmosphere-weather-climate-science/?utm_source=Facebook&utm_medium=Social&utm_content=link_fb20140416news-pollut&utm_campaign=Content
In the Wadena News we have a Looking Back column where we publish excerpts from W.News editions since 1908. In this week’s column, we printed a scan from an edition printed 50 years ago. That scan mentioned that there had been snow here at this time of year 50 years EARLIER. The lady who compiles the column says she has noticed, in all her years working with the archives, that weather does seem to go in decades-long cycles. But here’s a cycle that appears to be a 50-year one.
Blondi, our time line at the country house is only ten years of history, my Mom’s is over eighty years, and she thought this winter was an “old fashioned winter”, like the ones she knew as a child in the country here.
Fifty year cycle! I have to ask, how long did it last? The A+ answer to this question is one winter, LOL!