A MN Winter Storm

The weather forecasters have been talking all week about the big winter storm scheduled to hit MN over the weekend. It's predicted to be the worst of the century - which is only 7 years old but still...

With great hopes this will be my last MN winter, I decided to document the storm for myself. Above are two pictures I took on Friday about 5:30 in the afternoon. Yes, I know, it was already a little too dark for good pictures but that's when the idea struck me so that's when the pictures were taken. I work from home and don't usually but on this particular Friday I took a 'lunch hour' and went into town to stock up on groceries, gas, a little wine and get to the Post Office to mail two packages. As luck would have it the LP gas company came out Friday afternoon to fill my tank. So by this time on Friday we were all huddled down for the perfect storm.

And although you can't see it in the pictures above, I'd like to add that my yard is perfectly clean here, all my 'sins of omission' during the bitter cold weather the past 10 days or so have been pooper scooped away!

I had Dak entered in obedience trials in Minneapolis this weekend and went to bed Friday night figuring on not being able to make it. However, when I woke up this morning there was almost no new snow and although windy, conditions seemed good. I decided to make a go for it and took a quick shower. Yikes! When I stepped out of the shower just a few minutes later, my windows were coated in ice and the dogs I had left outside were barking and scratching at the door to come in. Had conditions changed swiftly! The ice was quickly coating every thing and it hurt just to stand outside and let the ice and wind hit your face. No way was I driving in this stuff.

I am ever so fortunate to work from home now after commuting from 45 to 62 miles one way for the last 22 years. I've nothing to prove to anyone these days about how tough I can be and what awful conditions I can drive and survive in. I've lived in Minnesota or Alaska my entire life and made more white knuckle car or airplane (yes, I had my pilot's license while living in AK) trips than I care to recount. I was staying home.





Here are roughly the same two scenes on Saturday afternoon about 5:00 PM. The ice finally turned to snow about 3:30 this afternoon. These pictures do not show the heavy coating of ice on all the tree branches, windows and power lines. I'm saying my prayers my power doesn't go out as it so frequently does out here. So far so good. I've been filling up water jugs during the day and cleaning up after myself, washing dishes after I made a pan of brownies this afternoon and even cleaning the skillet I used to make my supper before I sat down to eat tonight. It gets cold when I lose power and it gets dark. I can't knit or read or listen to music, but what I always miss the most is not having running water.

By 6:30 this evening the snow fall and wind were significantly stronger. It's looking as if the weather forecasts where right about this storm.

Meanwhile, I made great progress this afternoon on my bi-cable sweater and hope to have pictures for you tomorrow. It's exciting to see it finally coming together.