Big warm up this morning - almost thirty degrees warmer than yesterday morning. Of course it was still only 12 friggin' degrees out. Snowing now as well. It's like a real winter this year. I don't usually bitch too loud about the winter weather. I like the change of seasons and I usually get out and do things outside in the cold. I don't ice fish or hunt, but I like to tramp around in the woods, ice skate, snow shoe - on the rare occasions we have enough snow on the ground to make it worth strapping them on. I don't even mind shoveling snow, within reason of course. I was watching the weatherman the other day and he summed up how I'm feeling about the current weather. "The frigid temperatures are taking the fun out of winter." Yep.
Besides being dangerous outside with wind chills down around -25 to -35, it's a little tough keeping the old farm house warm. The original part of the house was built over 100 years ago and it has been added on to several times. I don't think there was ever a lot of thought put into insulation and sealing up drafts. I've improved things quite a bit since I moved in but I need to look into replacing some windows, especially on the west side of the house. We've got hot water heat, which I like, but there's a couple of places without fin tubes which creates cold spots. Also, with just the two of us in the house, there isn't a lot of movement so the air doesn't circulate much, which doesn't help much. I put a programmable thermostat in a few years back and it's set to drop the temperature at night but when it gets really cold out as it has been of late, the furnace takes forever to get caught back up in the morning. When I replaced the big through the wall air conditioner a couple of years ago, I bought one with a heating element in it as well. Smart move on my part. I tried it out a couple of times last winter but didn't really need it. I've been using it every morning lately, however. Warms things up PDQ. I don't know what the electric bill will be like but better than being miserable, or more importantly, better than having the Missus miserable.
Might start another jigsaw puzzle today. The one above I started after the Winter Classic on Monday and finished it up yesterday. It's a 500 piece puzzle. I've got a couple more that are 1000 pieces. Probably start one of those today - keep me busy until the weather breaks this weekend. I did see the old card table I'm using needs a little welding repair. The spot welds holding one of the legs on have broken loose. When it warms up a bit I'll take the table out to the shop and re-weld the leg. Likewise the scale I fixed the other day.
We've got a beam scale like at the doctor's office. There's a piece of 3/16" key stock on all four corners underneath the platform that slip into square holes. There doesn't seem to be anything holding them in the hole other than a little tension when not in use. One of them popped out and I was able to wrestle it back into the hole but it wouldn't hurt to put a little tack weld on it so it won't come out again - do all four corners, in fact.
Stay warm!
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