Christmas 2014 Snowstorm - Sarah's photos

Sarah sent me some photos from her camera so I figured I'd make a new post of just those.  It sure does look like we were having a bit of fun...we've both wanted snow for a while.

On a related note, I wanted cold weather to make the way for ice fishing...looks like we got it.  I had 4 degrees at the house this morning and my truck wouldn't start without a jumper battery assist... I could even feel my fingers trying to stick to my truck hood when scraping the windows!  The windchill is something else entirely...

I'm sure I'll regret saying this later, but for now the snowblower is entertaining to use.  I've never had one before!

Sarah taming the beast



It's a big machine....28" mouth and it can buck a bit when you get going



Last little bit coming off the roof

 

I like this photo

 

It was heavy, dense snow.  Coulda been perfect for making a snow cave!

 

Always rockin' the wool

First Christmas in Cocolalla

I was excited going into the Christmas holiday this year.  We had made the decision not to travel and to have our first Christmas in our new home.  That plus a day and a half off (totaling 4.5 days off) would be a very welcome break! 

Christmas morning arrived and we took it very slow...which was fine with me because my gut was plagued by shooting pains, here there everywhere.  I hadn't mentioned it before but I had taken something the night before to "aid in relief" and I think that just did NOT sit well with me.  Consequently, I had those pains for most of the day...which basically ruined my plan to pig out with a ham dinner.  We eventually made the ham but just snacked on it.  We opened gifts...for the first time it was just the two of us, which I have to say was quite a shock to our "systems" as it harbored the continual feeling of something being wrong.  It was, in all honesty, a little lackluster.  We got very nice things from people and then felt guilty that we didn't do MORE for them.  So we commiserated, took the dog on a walk, and I think I figured something out about the guilt.  It really is more fun to watch people open gifts that you got for them (or better yet, made for them) than to receive them.    That was Christmas day.

Friday got me to looking into cleaning clothes dryers.  Ours has been taking a long time to dry clothes and, what we think, to be the main culprit in our high energy bills.  The internet can be a truly wonderful thing as I learned a lot.  The fact that it wasn't drying fast was more likely do to an airflow issue rather than an element going bad and my first look in to where the heat enters the drum showed a LOT of lint build-up.  (Did you know those things need periodic cleanings?  Like taking it apart to do just that?  I didn't...and it didn't look like the folks before us knew it either.)  So there I was, behind this machine with my headlamp on, a vacuum hose, and a garbage bag...taking the back off and proceeding to disassemble the whole thing.  It was a mess!  I filled a total of about one grocery bag with lint that was covering things and generally just stuck everywhere.  That done, I put it all back together (successfully!) and am now hoping I see a difference in our energy bill.  Then we headed to town.

This is what I could see from the inside

 

This is the bottom of the blower shoot...(the thing that basically feeds the lint screen)

We ran some errands and headed home around 4:30.  One of Sarah's friends texted her and told her there was a bad wreck on the highway home...but that was at 2:30 and we didn't think much of it.  Well, we got stuck in a huge traffic jam as they were still clearing the accident site and I sweated as I watched my battery gauge slowly go down.  By the time we got home the headlights were having a helluva time keeping the road illuminated and progressively getting dimmer.  (Now, this is a brand new battery....this SHOULDN'T be happening.)  Once home I broke out the tools and looked at my battery connections....hoping this was just a bad connection and the movement of the truck was shaking the wire so it didn't have as good of contact with the terminal.  I noticed a lot of corrosion on the positive cable connection so I cleaned that off and believed I had solved the problem.  I jumped in and took off down the road, determined to charge the battery back up.  Unfortunately, after a mile or so the lights began to dim QUICKLY.  I rapidly turned around and headed back as they continued to get weaker...then my dashboard lights went out, then the radio went black...uh oh.  The truck was bucking and snorting but I was able to coax her to within 10 yards of our driveway before she gave out completely.  My plan had been to coast into the neighbor's big driveway (to make towing easier if it came to that.)  So I went over there and he offered to help me push it in there...but when I got in it the lights came on and she turned over!  Hurriedly I got it to where he indicated and learned that the alternator went completely out.  (Turns out he has been building cars since he was about 12...good guy to know!!)  Luckily he said, "it's an easy fix, come over in the morning and I'll help you take this one out so you can go to town and get a new one...then I'll help you put it in."  Awesome awesome awesome!  (Oh, by the way, I also learned that new batteries...less than a year old...can regenerate themselves...which I never thought about before and never even knew was possible.)

Saturday morning had me messing with that.  I learned a lot and was able to successfully replace the alternator with not too much more than a teacher there to instruct me.  Like most things, it's more about confidence than the extent of knowledge that makes the most difference.  I was most worried about the belt and getting that back on than anything and I told him, his simple reply was, "why?"  Turns out the only answer was "lack of confidence" but I kept that to myself.



It started snowing gently in the morning and just got heavier and heavier towards the evening.

 

That done around midday, I went down the hill to the house...almost getting stuck on the wet snow that was falling...which turned to instant ice once compacted....BUT I made it back up the hill to where I stopped.  And made a mistake.  I pushed the parking brake!!!  Quickly realizing my error, I popped it and headed down the road to make sure I hadn't frozen it up...which I had, on one side.  Son of a BITCH!  Come...ON!  I want ONE day to relax!  I headed home and proceeded to crawl around under the back tires...the snow clinging to the truck slowly melting and dripping off (because of the heat from the exhaust pipe) and soaking me.  I needed help so I recruited Sarah to come up and press the brake and release it (with me underneath) so I could observe what things "should" look like.  Then came a hammer.  Then the brake pedal got REALLY stuck.  Out of frustration I pushed it to the floor and pulled the release again and BINGO!  (I think the heat from the exhaust slowly melted the ice that must be in the wire's sheath.  It still worries me though, ever get like that?  Your mind telling you, "I don't think the rpms were that high before, but I can't remember because I never paid attention."

Then we watched the snow fall into the night.  In the morning there was nine new inches of heavy snow.  Time to figure out the snow clearing.  We have a roof that's been damaged in the past by letting compacted snow sit for too long...so our first order of business was shoveling off the roof!  With the two of us, that only took an hour...but then we  probably spent another hour on the deck / porch getting the compacted snow that came from the roof, off.  Following that was probably over another hour learning how to use the big ass snowblower I bought last summer and clearing the driveway.  (But honestly, that was kinda fun.  The thing can chew through snow like no one's business AND toss it up to 50 feet!)  All this followed by a quick trip to the dump and we were done. 

Looking up the driveway.

 

Before

 

After

 

Looking down the driveway after it was cleared

 

I was having enough fun that I cleared the turnaround too

 

We did hold pretty darn good attitudes all day, which was good

 

Overall, not really any days to relax but I sure did learn a lot and definitely got some exercise!

Tag Soup

The 2014 big game hunting season has come and gone for me.  The elk were out for me from day one because of all that stuff I mentioned before, but I figured the deer hunting would be easier.  Since huckleberry season I'd been seeing a lot of deer around in the places I was wandering and figured, "If nothing else I should be able to get a couple of those."  Hmmm, never expect that I guess. 

When we were still in elk camp I was on a drive looking for grouse one evening.  I turned down a road I hadn't been on before and got into a neat lodgepole stand.  I came around a corner and saw a HUGE whitetail buck.  His body was huge, his "bib" was a large patch of white in an otherwise green forest, he had a wiiiide rack with about six? short tines on each side, AND he was only about 30 yards off the road!!  I rolled by him with my mouth hanging open and honestly my first thought was, "I'll bet that's one of those Fish and Game robo-deer!"  (I thought maybe they were trying to bust people up there for road hunting.)  But then this darn thing just tracked me with it's eyes and head as I slowly drove by.

What the hell!!!?  It's REAL?

I drove down the road a ways and grabbed my rifle and walked back to where I'd been.  There were some alders between us and I couldn't see his vitals...just his face.  As soon as I had them cleared he calmly turned and disappeared in the trees.  Oh sure, I went up the hill and tried to follow him but he was long gone. 

I still have trouble believing he was real...amazing.  But he was definitely the king of THAT hill, so I'm okay with him still roaming around.

The next day we broke camp and headed home in a serious downpour.  On my way home I drove up a road near the house just to see if people were out deer hunting down there yet.  That's when I rolled by ANOTHER buck standing about 30 yards off the road, staring at me.  He was a pretty four-point and I contemplated trying for a shot.  I turned around and drove by again, still there.  I did this TWO more times and he didn't move!  I finally decided I didn't want to be done with hunting season so early (and also, the rifle was in the case in the bed of the truck.)  I stopped in front of him and it wasn't until I opened the door that he ran off.  Cool!

I went back up there the next day with the 30-30 hoping for an easy shot.  I hadn't really walked around in there, so I was roaming a bit and ran into three does at about 40 yards.  I counted coupe on all of them by having them in my sights and basically saying "bang."  I never took a shot for whatever reason....and, that was the last time I saw any deer in that area.  But after running into a veritable herd of turkeys, THAT'S where I was the next day with the shotgun...collecting a nice young one.

Later in the month I ended up on the state land near Priest Lake.  I got within 10 yards of a nice buck in one of the thick patches and could have tried a shot at the back of his head when he slowly bounded away....but didn't.  Then I got lost...I hate flat ground like that.  When I finally checked the GPS I was going exactly 180 degrees the wrong way!  Luckily that little gizmo got me back to the truck.  The following weekend I was up there again and didn't see a thing...but ended up getting turned around yet again...I was DONE with doing that, I'll tell ya!

And finally I had one more shot at a doe on State land near the house.  But STILL didn't take a shot...because of the young one right on her heels. 

The rest of season was filled with seeing nice bucks on private land...tempting me to take a shot. Or does walking through our yard.  Again tempting, but the neighbors down the hill are just too close for me to comfortably do that.  I DID manage to have a bowhunter pass within 10 yards of me and never see me...that was interesting.  I didn't say anything because I didn't want to literally scare the shit out of him!

The very last evening I went out, I ended up in an area that had good sign...but also had a plethora of road hunters.  They circled my "spot" until it got dark, so I just stayed hunkered until after shooting light then got to the truck and unloaded the gun for the last time of the year.

Overall, it was a very good year.  I didn't take any unethical or hurried shots and, more importantly, I didn't wound anything.  I learned some good country and found a lot more places to go next year.  But, I'm thinking I'm going to try hunting deer when everyone else is hunting elk...THAT was when they all seemed to be out just staring at roads!!