Well, that was exactly as easy as I thought it would be .......

Subtitle: I don't have this Colorado Winter thing down yet!!

We had a blizzard blow through a couple of days ago and it dumped about 8" of snow on us. I thought I'd be a superman and go out and shovel the driveway clear of snow ....... I'm guessing not all of you understand how heavy and hard to move 1300 square feet of snow 8" deep really is! I know I didn't.

The neighbor said not to shovel the snow - it was light enough to just blow off with a leaf blower. I tried that ..... what he didn't say is that you can't wait until there's 8" of snow to use the blower - that's just too much snow to move! So, I shoveled ..... for a little over three hours. Got it clean finally, and enjoyed the bright sunshine later in the day and the next day .....

Just enough sun and warmth to begin to melt what was left ..... and then the temperature dropped. The last two days it's been in the mid teens - during the day. At night it approaches zero. Snow was predicted.


Sure enough, this morning it was snowing when we woke up. I have the weather forecast thingy, and it said about 1" accumulation was due and that snow in our area would stop in 66 minutes - how do they know how many minutes snow will last? That was around 8:00 this morning; it's now 2:00 PM and it's still snowing - hard! I've already moved 3" accumulation .... twice.

I wanted to try the snow / leaf blower trick while there wasn't much snow. It works surprisingly well. The only issue I found was that when the blower gets near a wall or in a confined space like our front walkway, the snow goes everywhere ..... especially up my collar, under my hat, in my eyes, fogging my glasses ...... When I finally get the blower under control, the snow I blew up into my face and onto my glasses freezes and I can't see ......

I got the area near the front walk cleared and started down the driveway next to where my car was parked. As I approached the front, I spy a flat front tire. Now that's not a really big deal. The first flat I got with the Sequoia was last summer ..... in temperatures over a hundred degrees. The biggest issue is the way Toyota stored the spare. It's tucked up under the rear of the car, held in place by a sort of hoist / winch mechanism. In order to get at it, I have to open the rear door hatch.

So, I go to the driver's door and pull on the handle - the door's frozen shut. I go into the garage, get my paint scraper heat gun, hook it up and unfreeze the lock. I start the car and push the button to open the rear door ..... it's frozen shut too. Back to the paint scraper heat gun.

An hour later and I have the rear door open so I can access the tool pouch with the tire removal tools.

Last Summer it took me an hour or so just to figure out how to get the spare down. Today it didn't take as long - maybe 50 minutes or so - because it's so cold that when I take off my gloves to push the 3 foot long unwinder into the little hole to lower the winch I can't feel my fingers or find the slot the unwinder goes in. Finally, success! The spare is on the ground and I can jack up the front and swap wheels. Then I'll put the truck in the garage so it'll thaw out.

We've only been in the house around 1-1/2 months and while we've opened all the boxes, we haven't got all the contents into the house. And, some of the stuff that we brought from Alameda won't make the cut - going to go to the kids, to the Goodwill, or to building materials recycle. And, we've cleared only one side of the garage - the other is full of boxes, chairs, bed frames, rugs, etc. In order to get my truck into the garage, I have to move all the stuff into the back of the garage ....... which only takes another hour or so.

Now to put my truck into the shelter of the garage. When we designed the house we specified a really pretty curved "dry stack" rock wall in front. Later, we had to add a handrail on the entry stairway. Now, because of the wall and the handrail, I can't get my truck into the Northern garage space! And, Deb's car is in the Southern garage space!

Easy peasy! I'll just move Deb's car to the Northern garage space and put mine in the Southern space. Only, the garage door is frozen shut ....... back to the snow shovel to dig the ice and snow from the bottom of the door. Success! Deb's car gets moved and mine gets put into the garage. Feeling good now!

I've been at clearing the driveway in this "minor accumulation of snow" since 8:00 this morning - a little over 6 hours. I sure hope that it doesn't snow heavily this Winter!

The neighbor just popped his head out of the door ..... he said "When you get done with your driveway clearing, come over and I'll show you how well my Toro snow blower machine works!"

Cheers!