Snow Day!

Face full of snow

This winter continues to be... interesting. We were supposed to go to Austin last Thursday, and instead we braved a blizzard (well it was supposed to be a blizzard but was just blowing snow) to go to the hospital so I could find out I was having a gallbladder attack and have lots and lots of gallstones. While poking around in there they also found a pancreatic anomaly (abnormality?), but I won't know what that means when they get me in for an MRI this week. It needs to be done before I have my gall bladder removed (tentatively scheduled for a week and a half from now, depending on how my meeting with the surgeon goes this week). 

Gall bladder stuff seems to be pretty common and minor (through quite painful, as another friend can attest) so I'm not worried about it. But I am bummed that we didn't get to go to Austin and have to either postpone or cancel our trip to Oaxaca Mexico (we are currently scheduled to go the day before my surgery). I haven't cancelled the flights yet in case the surgeon decides something other than Feb 1 for the rip-out date. Oh, and no more attacks since that first one a few days ago so don't imagine me here lying on a chaise and moaning in pain. I'm in my cozy morning chair (in the dining room) getting ready to do taxes--which is painful enough. 

All chained up and nowhere to go

Though we didn't get the 10-14 inches of snow predicted, and the winds weren't 45 mph, we did get quite a bit of snow Wednesday, and again more Thursday. We barely made it back up the drive on Thursday after driving into town to pick up mail. Friday I was feeling a bit stir-crazy as Dave had tied me to a chair all day Thursday (figuratively) to recuperate so I drove back into town to get Diet Coke and the mail. There was no way on earth I was going to be snowbound with Dave and Jessie and no Diet Coke. They can get... cranky. We hadn't been able to pick up the mail at our other house on Thursday because we didn't have the right key (for the third time in a row) so I wanted to get it too. 

Halfway down the drive, and with no way to back up successfully, I knew that I would never make it back up--even with 4WD and rear differential lock, and traction control, and whatever else the 4Runner has. So my main stop in town had to be to get chains. I have never put chains on a vehicle. I remember being in the car coming down the mountain from skiing when I was young and having to stop so dad could put the chains on, and I remember the cursing and struggling that accompanied the task. But needs must when the devil drives in snow.

My morning view of the deck

My first stop was Ace Hardware--they don't carry them. Next was Murdoch's Ranch and Home Supply, and though they carry them, they didn't have the size I needed. But I scored front and back chains at Beacon Tire, and the mechanic brought my 4Runner into their shop and showed me how to put them on. I had two different types--one for the front and one for the back as they did not have two matching sets in my size--so I had to learn two different ways to put them on. The mechanic jacked up the back of the car, then he  did one side of the car while I did the other. Then he checked my side. It was still not easy to do--and I banged my hand right on the finger I either dislocated or sprained the other day--so I decided to leave them on for the whole drive home. To get home I had to go on the mostly bare highway, you can only go 25 mph with chains on, and on bare pavement they bump and clang something awful. But I cannot imagine what it would have been like to have to put them on by myself, at the bottom of our drive, in deep snow, and without being able to jack the car up in back (if you can't jack it, you have to drive forward and back in the middle of putting them on to fit them. Even with the chains and all the other fancy-schmancy all-terrain stuff that car has, it was still a tough drive to the top of our mountain.

While hunting down chains, I asked everyone with whom I interacted if they knew anyone who did snow plowing. I even pulled up next to a guy in a truck with a plow on the front of it at a stoplight and rolled down my window to ask him if he plowed. Sadly he only did his own. I totally struck out on finding anyone, but I did go home with some leads.

This morning I got ahold of the guy who delivers our wood, and asked him, and he does do snow removal. Her can't come today, but he'll be here tomorrow morning. In the meantime, the sun is shining, and we're snug as bugs in a rug in our mountain retreat. Happy snow day, y'all!