Friday, February 17, 2006, 19:38
A Three-Footed Day
The dogs were going around outside on three feet this morning, holding up first one paw and then another.
I don't blame them. The air temperature was 4 degrees below zero Fahrenheit -- with a windchill of 20 to 30 degrees below zero. The cold temperature seemed to bother our little Shetland Sheepdog, Pixie, more than it did our Springer Spaniel, Charlie. But Pixie only weighs half as much as Charlie, so she has less body mass to help her stay warm.
If I had four feet, I would go around on three, too. But since I've only got two feet, it doesn't make sense to try to hop around on one. Going on one foot would take me just that much longer to feed Kajun and Isabelle and to carry water and hay for them, not to mention taking the dogs for a walk. And I would just as soon spend as little time outside as possible.
This afternoon, the temperature is still 4 degrees below zero. And the windchill is still 20 to 30 degrees below zero with a stiff wind out of the north/northwest.
The "snowstorm" yesterday brought only an inch of snow here, although the weather forecasters are reporting that points south received more than six inches of snow and that eastern Wisconsin, including Green Bay, got 13 inches of snow.
When the storm moved out of here, it was replaced by Arctic high pressure. The temperature tomorrow morning is predicted to be 21 degrees below zero with an afternoon high below zero.
Out of all the weather we have in Wisconsin, this is probably my least-favorite, although to tell you the truth, it's a toss-up when it comes to 95 degrees in the summer with a dewpoint of 85 and humidity that is 95 percent. I think I am better able to withstand very cold weather as compared to very hot and humid weather.
Still, when it is cold out like this, each day seems like it is at least a week long. The weather is not predicted to warm up at all until next week, and then it won't be terribly warm, lows in the single digits and highs in the 20s.
By the time next week arrives, however, lows in the single digits and highs in the 20s will seem downright warm!
Then again, that's the wonderful thing about winter in Wisconsin. When spring arrives, people are ready to truly appreciate it, and mild spring weather really does seem like some sort of miracle. . .
LeAnn R. Ralph
Thursday, February 16, 2006, 22:18
Democracy At Its Best (Among Other Things)
A young man stopped by the house on Wednesday afternoon. He is from the next town over, and he is running for county board supervisor.
As I understand it, he is running for the county board primarily to make it an election for at least one of the positions on the board. So many of the board positions are unopposed by any other candidates when the term is up. Sample ballots are published in the newspaper, and there is often a long list of single candidates (the incumbents) for each position with no one to oppose them.
The same is true for the town boards in this area. Everyone wants to complain about the "rotten" job being done by the town chair and the town board members, but no one wants to run for the town board.
At any rate, I cannot say that I necessarily agree with the opinions of the young man who is running for the county board. He talked for about 15 minutes, and among other things, told me that he had been deeply opposed to the ethanol plant being built a few miles away. I covered all of the hearings for the ethanol plant because I was working for the newspaper at the time. I tried to keep my reporting as fair and unbiased as possible, but my personal opinion is that the more we can do to reduce our dependency on foreign oil, the better off we will be. Plus, the ethanol plant will give farmers another market for their corn. Instead of "shipping it to the river" (the Mississippi) as they say, they can sell it closer to home and save the shipping costs.
It doesn't matter if I agree with the young man's opinions. I give him tons of credit for trying to make an election out of at least one of the positions. The same people tend to stay in office for years and years with no one else to run against them.
Be that as it may, most of the people who serve on the country board are retired farmers who have been retired from farming for 10 to 20 years. They tend to be conservative and frugal. Nothing wrong with that, I say. But, in not too long, many of them will either die, or they will be unwilling or unable to serve on the county board. And then what will we do for county board supervisors?
Vet Clinic -- I took Gilligan and MaryAnne into the vet clinic on Wednesday for their rabies and distemper and feline leukemia vaccinations. Gilligan is my big red tom, and MaryAnne is his red and white long-haired sister. I was barely able to squeeze both of them into the kitty carrier. Maybe I need a bigger kitty carrier? It's a small carrier, and the two cats together weigh about 25 pounds. I didn't dare carry the kitty carrier by the handle! I just picked up and carried it like a box.
Anyway, while I was at the vet clinic, I told them about Randy's escapade with retrieving Sophie from the shelf in the basement last week and about him wearing coveralls and welding gloves and how mad she was about being plucked off the shelf and that it took Sophie three days to get over it and to start acknowledging our presence again. (For three days, she went around the house ignoring us; wouldn't come when we called her name; wasn't interested in playing with her rabbit fur mice when we tried to play with her; wasn't interested in playing with the computer cursor.)
The vet and the vet tech thought the whole was so funny, they laughed until they had tears in their eyes.
Well -- they can laugh if they want to, but I'm bringing Sophie in there next week for her first round of vaccinations. They probably won't think it's so funny after wrestling with Sophie for a little while, or more specifically, trying to avoid Sophie's teeth and claws.
Jeepers. I hope Sophie behaves herself. I would not want her to ruin my reputation at the vet clinic of having nice kitties!
Of course, after I've been telling them what a little brat she is, Sophie will probably go into the clinic and act like an angel. Which is fine with me.
Snow -- It is snowing today. South of here, the snow is supposed to accumulate up to six or eight inches or more. I don't think we'll get that much here. The wind is from the wrong direction (north/northwest) for us to get much snow. What we will get, though, is a drop in temperatures. The low Saturday morning is supposed to be 15 degrees below zero. All together, the next four or five days are supposed to have lows below zero and highs in the single digits or teens.
I am not looking forward to it.
Neighbor Lady -- One of our neighbor ladies fell and broke her hip Wednesday afternoon. She is the mother of the woman who owned the horse that died (when I had to take the tractor down there to pull the horse out of the barn). I had just come home from town with Gilligan and MaryAnne and was carrying some groceries inside when I heard the ambulance coming. I could not see the ambulance because of the big hill between our place and their place, but when the siren cut off abruptly, I figured it had pulled in there.
The keys were still in the truck, so I drove down to the neighbor's (they live a half mile away).
Sure enough, the ambulance had pulled up by the garage. One of the daughters came out of the house to tell me that their mother had fallen in the bathroom and that they were pretty sure she had broken her hip. The ambulance was going to take her to a hospital in Eau Claire (about 25 miles away). I told them that if they needed someone to take care of their animals in the next few days or weeks or whatever, to let me know and I would be happy to do that for them.
LeAnn R. Ralph