Biscuit, Honey and Mind Reading?

Yesterday I made a mess of big ol' biscuits with sausage gravy. I had a few biscuit left over so, this morning I had a couple with some good Missouri clover honey that I get from my ex brother in law. The have some hives on their place and the hive owner pays them in honey, lots of it.
  I warmed the biscuit and doused them with this good honey and thoroughly enjoyed this treat. I looked out the window and...crap! It's snowing again. great.

Here is my breakfast

My question is this... How did Stephen know?

The War on Snowmageddon

Damn! The snow looks to be about 10 inches deep.  I paid two local kids to clear off the mass of snow in my back parking lot, the walkway around the house and the back steps. I had already done the front porch, the walk to the porch and the back deck. I got the kids started and tried to leave for cash to pay the mongrels with. Notice I said tried. I got stuck in the gateway, scraped up the side of my truck bed, got stuck in the alley 5 times, dug myself out 5 times and finally made it to the street. Made the bank run and came home. Decide not to attempt the alley again so I had to shovel the front parking spot on the street and the sidewalk along that area. FUCK!!!!!!! I'm beat, I hurt, I'm pilled up and drowsy. Just waiting on tonight's forecast of -14 degrees. Weee! Ain't we havin' fun now! Really, I'm getting to damn old and busted up for this crap anymore. But it seems I'm stuck here. I'm dreaming of a warmer clime with scantily clad women bouncing along their way. Wait. Let's see, Atlanta just had a snow event, Virginia has had several of them and many other Southern states have had snow this year. I lived near Corpus Christi Texas as a younger man and experienced a light snow and one ice storm in the same winter. So it seems the wonderful South is not the place it's cracked up to be. But it's still better than what we get around here on a regular basis. Anyway, I'm beat.

The City hard at work...

 

 

 

 My jacked up truck bed and a pile of snow...

More snow.....

 

 

 

 

 The back of the house...

 

 

 

 The aftermath of the alley adventure...

Here It Comes...Again

I just got the sleet cleared away and now the weather guessers are calling for another storm bringing 5-9 inches of snow on Tuesday. And the temps are falling again. It was 10 degrees this morning. Great just what I need. I can barely pay my electric bill for January and now it appears that February is shaping up to keep the furnace cranking away. UGH! sigh.

I'm ready for a change, sunny, warm and all that stuff.

UHGG!

I awoke from a warm slumber to the sound of...nothing. No cars, no trucks, just quiet. I crawled out of my snug cocoon of piled quilts, threw on some comfortable sweats and peaked out the window. What did I see? Sleet. Fucking sleet. An inch and a half of sleet. Frozen droplet that fall from the sky to turn the roads into, what seems to be, a table covered in white ball bearings. Nice. I put on my coveralls, boots and a hat, grabbed my new snow shovel and went to battle. The accumulation was nicely crusted over and broke into loose piles of the slick shiny beads and slabs and chunks. Whew! Now that that is done, what to do? I'm sick of looking at these walls, watching that flickering idiot box, staring out the windows. My favorite flea market is closed on the weekends. It seems I lost my fascination with gunshops through the gaping hole in my pocket and there are no small shops that a guy can go to and just hang out. Maybe a trip to wander around Cabelas or Bass Pro Shops. I dunno, I just know that I'm NOT sitting around the damn house today. Sleet or no.

I did receive this in my email this morning. And it makes me proud to be a grandpa. My little Diamond.

And The Snow Flies

Snowing, and getting colder. The weather guessers claim -20 to -30 wind chills by Monday. BRRRR!
With the snow comes the strangers on AVT's. I live in a very commercialized area. With each snow comes a fleet of four wheelers from who knows where. I know they do not live in this neighborhood. But they do come and race up and down my street, doing donuts and generally having a good time of themselves. I get tired of it already. Tonight a KCPD cop drove down the street, watched two of the ATV's spinning round and round and then drove off. So much for law enforcement. It makes no sense to me to have an ATV only use it in the city. We do have areas that these units can be ridden in. Some public areas allow them and there are a couple of places that are for dirt bikes and ATV's to rip it up in. But no, these jack offs have to wait for a nice quiet snowy evening to run up and down the streets of Kansas City. My, how times change. Many years ago my ex-brother-in-law was at his moms house and it snowed while he was there. He unloaded the three wheeler from the truck and took it to a local park. Night time, cold, snowing, deserted, he was having fun in the park. that is until Kansas City's finest appeared. Being the way he and I used to be, he flipped the bird and busted out of there. Many cops gave pursuit until finally thinking he had lost them in downtown KC, a bright light and a loud voice came from the sky. The light blinded him and he crashed, the voice told him to stay where he was. Moments later a small fleet of PD cars showed up, arrested him and carted his three wheeler away. Today? They watch and leave.

What I found And What's Coming

I went to the grocery store Sunday after noon to get a couple things Cherry Pie neglected to buy. I passed the liquor department on my way to the sausage freezer and saw a familiar red tag hanging below the Wild Turkey. Right turn...NOW! Yep Wild Turkey 101 on sale for $19.99! Looking frantically calmly through my wallet I found a hidden twenty dollar bill. Yahoo! A bottle went into the cart and I got the rest of my shopping done uninterrupted. Back home, I was putting the stuff away and reached to put the liquor in the "liquor cabinet" and found, shock, shock, a partial bottle of the same liquor. Holy Crap I coulda had a drink or two and didn't know it! Now I just gotta figure out when to have a drink or two. A cleaning gig every night M-F and an all freaking day job at the pawn shop Wednesday, Friday and Saturday. So that leaves Saturday night and Sunday. Sunday is usually reserved for household chores, lawn care and vehicle care and firearms projects. Saturday night it is. And Maybe Sunday evening. Relax have a drink or two, watch a show, visit with Cherry.

Sitting here looking out the window and I see a red squirrel sitting on the fence, leaves falling from the trees and a leaden sky hinting at a future of cold dreary days, days that give a boost to my soul and spirit. Winter is my time of the year. Cold, windy, snowy, icy, dark, dim, bright, crisp fall and winter is my time. Sipping hot chocolate, while listening to the wind howl and hearing the tappa tappa tap of ice pelting the windows. The squeak that snow makes when you walk on it during a really cold spell. And the best of all, the silence that reigns during a heavy snow storm. No cars, no kids, no nothing except the whisper of falling snow brushing through the trees.  Later on the scraping, banging of the snowplows racking up over time, filling in every ones driveways. Cursing them, the snow the, season and then looking at a mountain of shoveled snow and feeling tired, worn out, aching yet satisfied. Inside for a warm shower and one of my special hot chocolates. My season is fast approaching.

Cool Bike, Fall and Winter preps

I was over at Tam's place this morning and she had a link to some awesome old bicycles today. That sure brought back some memories. When I was a kid I was in the hospital for a tonsillectomy and when I got home I had a shiny new red bike waiting for me. Wow! Now we couldn't afford a Schwinn Stingray, but that was the coolest thing I ever had. Then Christmas came. Under the tree I found a sparkly vinyl banana seat, a chrome hi-rise sissy bar, apehanger handlebars, and a fat slick back tire! How cool was that? All parts were installed and I became the coolest kid in the neighborhood. I took great pride in the length of the black stripes I could lay in front of the house after flying down the street and lockin' up the brake. Hell, come time for the Jesse James Days festival I took first in the bicycle race. Not bad for a fat kid. Thanks folks!
______________________________________

Well, we had our first taste of Fall last night and this morning... low's in the low 40's and some places made it down to the high 30's. My kind of weather is comin' up! I love cool, cold weather. Add in some snow, sleet, freezing rain and I'm in hog heaven. Call me a freak but that's the way I am.. The worse it is the better I like it. I hope for a lot of snow this winter so I can cash in on the residential snow removal gig. Move over kids! Oh, that's right. Kids are too lazy to clear snow for cash now. Good for me. I found a place that had New Old Stock snow blades to fit my discontinued Cub Cadet 1330 for 400 dollars new in the box. They also had NOS bare mower decks which I need. Now I only need some cash. I need to knock together a winter shelter for the Cub if I plan to use it this winter.
________________________________________

Last night I listed all the things we need to do before winter sets in. Repair all the oil lamps, get more lamp oil, get an Aladdin style lamp, get spares for all the lamps, insulate the utility room floor, get more kerosene in stock, things like that. I keep hearing that natural gas prices are going to spike this winter so I want to augment our ng heat with the kerosene heater and the the Sun Heat electric furnace. If the lights go out from a broken limb or excessive ice we will have rudimentary heat. Ideally we need a generator so we can run the actual furnace in a power outage. What do you think Cherry Pie?