yesterday's snow

And here's my car! A snow day in Halifax, but later in the afternoon I made my way back to Truro for another important meeting.

Check out this great MSN Video: Storm batters Nova Scotia

ice jamming

On the banks of a Maine river after a flood. if I had a good camera I could have made marvellous close ups. The yard high chunks of ice with the sun shining through them - fantastic. There were children playing on the slabs, with careful parents watching. It looked like fun. And now an interview with my favourite: http://video.msn.com/video.aspx?mkt=en-CA&vid=b161d2f5-3388-4262-a6a5-2202f8a7a8d3

bright and cold

 

The coldest days are the brightest. I hope to go home tomorrow for a day at my house down the Valley. I'll put on my paint clothes and get back at painting the hallway. Pictures to follow in a day or two.

leftover leaf

 

This is a leftover leaf lost in a snow bank at the end of a cold day. And now (thanks Tina) some instructions for Peter Mansbridge and company:

iced bush

I walked by this bush that was under water dripping off a roof. It was just outside the door of a funeral parlour. While it was supposed to be a day off, I had a funeral to conduct and sermons to write. There is still more to do tomorrow. There are guidelines about working a forty hour week. I haven't figured out how to do this yet.

daylily revisited

I have hope

March 5 displayed one of my favourite daylilies. Here is what it looked like this past Saturday. One of my daylilies is called "My Hope". And here it what it looks like. There is always hope.

ice trees

On Thursday, driving to Nova Scotia, on a glorious sunny day, I passed through the evidence of an ice storm. So beautiful, but then there were places where the power had been out for three days, so dangerous. Leaving the snows of New Brunswick, over the pass, the grass was showing, the snow was melting and spring was happening. Winter crept in again on Friday, but this morning was glorious. If I could have lingered at home, I think that I would have had my cup of coffee on the front deck. Now I am back in the snow fields of New Brunswick.

spring portents

I used to look for snow drops, winter aconite and crocus to herald spring. From the looks of things they 'll be a long time coming. In recent years I have settled for three signs: The onions in the bag start to sprout. This has already happened. Dead skunks appear as road kill. I have neither seen nor smelled one this year. Must be too early. And ... Tim Horton's "Roll Up the Rim". And it's here! So now I forego filling my own mug, or getting a ceramic mug, and I ungreenly play the game with a cardboard cup. I have yet to win this year.

dirty day

Sleet, freezing rain, snow: I understand that it has hit the whole eastern seaboard from Georgia on up. So I walked inside the post office and took this picture. I must be getting desperate.

fed up

I am absolutely fed up with winter. Enough already! I have a bad case of the February blues. Bottoming out and dreaming of green - This is contagious.

melt

I was walking along Main Street. It's my little act of green. So I snapped these icicles. I love their glitter, but the ice is jamming on the roofs.

The kitchen ceiling at the church fell in yesterday. They should sit up and take notice at that one. The ice had jammed and the roof is flat. So the melt found its way down the walls and along the ceiling until... Now with the hole the hot air is moving up to the roof which is leading to more melt and there were a lot of buckets around today. The place is falling down around our ears. This is, of course, the responsibility of a bunch of guys, and the less said the better. Of course, I could have posted a picture of the kitchen ceiling, what's left of it.

Holy Ground Hog Day

On this mommentous day - I have always truly believed that, since there are an awful lot of ground hogs, that each locality has its own little wild critter that pokes its nose out just after dawn on February 2 and then goes back to bed, for either 6 weeks, or 5 weeks and 6 days. Although we never actually see her, we do see our shadows, or not. This year it was sunny and warmer - so shadows - so 6 weeks. It's not over yet.

I wrote this as a commnet on Debbie's blog and then decided that it also suited my own little contribution. Here is evidence of melting snow - dirty snow.

And then there is this furry varmit who hasn't left the sofa all day and evening. Moreover, she hasn't ventured out in days. She is unfamiliar wih ground hogs and a failure at weather prediction. That is except when she washes behind her ears, which is a sure sign of rain.

bare naked statue revisited

I took this as I walked by the little statue this afternoon. This is the same little garden ornament that I showed on January 16. Statues are amusing in the winter with the snow covering naked limbs; or the noble statues in the city squares with the pigeons sitting on the head and the droppings staining down the face and shoulders. I remember our Canadian Sir John A MacDonald with his friendly pigeons. I also remember the story that I heard when I was a child about someone the family knew who was in an automobile accident. He was knocked unconscious and laid out on the grass by the statue at the cenotaph - an angel hovering over a marching Great War soldier, Westmount, Quebec. He came to and looked up and saw the angel above him. He thought that he had died.

snow window

Snow has come again. The roads are treturous. And I have computer difficulties. So this machine that I am working on now needs to be turned in. And the following day, weather permitting, I hope to drive home to Nova Scotia for a couple of days, so postings may be more sporadic.

April Fool's

The worst storm of the year, so far, swept in over night. The first picture is inside the door and the second is looking out the door. I actually could not open the door. So after a teaser of an early spring day yesterday, winter returned with a vengeance. I have just under four weeks left here. I wonder if I shall be driving east with my snow tyres still on? I think that I have cabin fever. Is there a cure?

Lynx

This was the first day that the temperature warmed up and the snow began to really melt, but it was just a teaser and there is a winter storm warning for tonight.
The picture was taken by a friend in her back garden. The first is the lynx' tracks and the second is the lynx. I think that this was captured on a cell phone. This is one reason why cats stay indoors.

9 days

It's been nine days into spring, and there is not a murmur of it here. Winter is wearing a little thin.

no snow really!

From the frozen north I arrived in Annapolis County, Nova Scotia to find - wait for it - no snow! So I had to take a picture of my friend's garden. Now, I know, that winter is not over, and there will be storms to come - but no snow! I went over to what will be again my house on the shore - and no frost - I could pull out the weeds. This is Paradise.

melting

It's melting a little, not because the temperature is warming up, but because the sun is higher in the sky.

frozen crab apple

I've been housebound with the mother-of-all-colds which has lodged itself in my ear. But out my window is this frozen fruit. In about a month the robins will return and strip the tree, and then spring will really have begun.