Jacob

Winter Storm Jacob wasn’t as bad as it could have been. Two storms in a row we got lucky. From Friday afternoon to Saturday morning, we had 3” of snow with ¼” of ice on top. In places, such as the driveway in front of the garage, the wind blew away all the snow so that the cement was glazed with ice. It warmed up as the storm moved through. To Terry’s delight, it stayed above freezing until he got all the ice off the driveway. We had light snow through the morning. When I went out to brush off the solar panels, I discovered that all the snow before the ice had blown off. A half-inch of light snow was on top of a layer of ice. I brushed off the snow on the bottom 3 rows of solar panels. The sky was overcast, but enough light/heat was getting through to form a layer of water next to the glass.  We weren’t at peak capacity, but the panels I brushed off were making about twice the Wh as the ones I didn’t.

It was 0° this morning. I fed the chickens and changed their water. It was too cold to open the coop door for them. To keep them from getting bored while they were “cooped up,” I put their scratch grains in an old Coke bottle with a few holes cut in the sides and hung that from the ceiling. It makes it more of a challenge.

Other than that, I decided to hunker down inside. It is a beautiful sunny day, but I’m too much of a wuss to go for a walk when it’s so cold. (It's not even that cold anymore--22°.) Since I have nothing else to blog about, I’ll post some cute cat pictures. Skippy has gotten too big. He’s on a diet, which he does not care for much. Jane got him a ball with holes in the side, not unlike the Coke bottle for the scratch grains. He rolls it around on a boot tray to get the food out. It slows him down and gives him a little exercise. I should get one for me!

Skippy with his food ball

I wanted to get a picture of him in his water bowl, but he is not cooperating. He is one of those cats who prefer to drink by licking water off his paw. It’s a mess. I fooled him last year by putting the water bowl high up on the cage. He waved one paw below the bowl while he drank. It was hilarious! This year, however, he figured out how to stand with both paws in the water. Then he likes to hop up on my lap with his wet paws. Fun!

Right now, he is in his favorite spot, sitting on my left arm in front of my laptop. So helpful.

"Helping" with my blog post

When I’m done with this, I’ll put my computer away so he can stretch out on my legs. He’s mostly very cute. We still can’t trust him to not chew on electrical cords when left alone, which is why we still put him in the kennel when we can’t watch him.

Stretched out on my lap

Not much happening here this week. Time for football!