The Four Corners of Spokane

A productive weekend was had by...well, somebody probably had a productive weekend. It wasn't us!

I had lots of little projects to do over the weekend and I did a lot of them. But it felt like I drove around on Saturday to all four corners of Spokane.

Mom's cars are not being driven so I went up to her place and started them and drove around briefly. I had to drive the Honda more than the other because the battery was stoned cold dead. Even after I started it and drove it home, it was not charged enough to restart the vehicle. I'm thinking it may need a new battery.

Anyway, while I was driving around to the four corners of Spokane, Susan was busy finishing the stenciling in the Living Room.

I think she is finally finished. And it looks marvelous!

Icy to Sloppy

What a difference a weather system makes!

Last week we were hovering just above zero. Two days ago, it snowed four inches. Today, it's 45 degrees and that snow is a sloppy slushy soup of goop.

I'm going to have to go dig out the corner sewer grate after work tonight. There is a lot of water pooling out there.

I'm part of a Neighborhood Social Media thing called Corbin Park Spokane. People who can be on it are limited to the immediate borders of our neighborhood.

It's got a lot of superfluous stuff on there...lost pets, stuff for sale. But it is also a great spot to find out about suspicious people seen in the area, break ins, and other news.

Last week, one neighbor posted about everyone being sure to clear their sidewalks and make Corbin Park safe for walking. Last night, she reported that Corbin Park was 100% sidewalk clean.

That's pretty cool! Of course, a day of higher temperatures and rain helped with that as much as the shovelers, methinks.

Mo Sno

The two inches of snow that were forecast for today turned into four. I got home and got my designated portion of the world cleaned off and ship shape.

We are finally having a winter around here. 

We are just hanging out tonight. Susan is looking to do a little more stenciling and I have some work to do on my computer upstairs. No, my work does not involve visiting some sites of questionable repute.

Here's a picture of what Susan painted tonight. She is almost done.

She just has to finish this last portion on the right side of the fireplace, and then I think she will have reached the end of the stenciling line.

Broken String

I finally broke the string of consecutive posts at 35. Well, it had to happen sooner or later. The good news is that now I have some actual stuff of interest to post.

I skied yesterday with Mark. We went to Lookout Pass, which is my preferred ski hill.

We had planned to go up on Friday. We went so far as to take the day off. We concluded upon rising that it was too cold. The temperature on the mountain was 4. We decided to wait a day and see if it got better.

It did!

We drove up yesterday and arrived to a great parking spot and a clear blue sky. We only skied 6 runs due to a complication.

On our ride up the Number One chair for our fourth run, the lift stopped when we were a little more than half way up. After five minutes of no progress, we began to think there was something wrong.

Above is a picture of our view for most of the ordeal. We were close too a pole, but not close enough. After about 25 minutes, the lift moved suddenly...and then stopped just as suddenly. It continued doing that for the next 15 minutes. 

They finally got it moving steadily but slowly...which was fine at that point. Just get us off.  We unloaded at the top 50 minutes after the lift first stopped. 

You have no idea how heavy skis can get when they are just hanging off your legs for that length of time. 

A ski patrolman took our names and numbers at the top (we're not sure why)and we continued on our way. 

The number two lift was still running so we took a couple of runs but by then, the chill in our limbs was taking hold. 

We realized that if we went to the lodge, that would be it for skiing.

They had gotten everyone off the lift and now it was shut down. We ended up getting a voucher for another day, so all those runs were for free...or $39, depending on how you look at it.

I have chores to do today. Chief among them is to hook up an extension cord to the roof to prevent a giant icicle from ruining the ceiling of the Dining Room.

Okay! I was successful in getting the cicle down.

Susan continued to work on stenciling and I got a coat of paint on my window frames. Before that however, I was able to custom fit them to their respective places. It's a good thing I did too because they would not have fit. I'm still not sure they will after I get glass in them.

Colder Than A . . .

It is clear and cold out. I think the temperature is about 10 degrees right now.

We have both just gotten home a short while ago and are puttering around the house. I'm going to go out and get a coat of paint on my storm window frames. I don't think Susan is going to do anything other than her nightly exercises and then her nightly arm curls with wine.

Piano Man

I have just finished my weekly piano lesson. I'm not sure I have talked about them much here and since I really don't have anything else to write about, I shall expound now.

I took piano lessons from age 7 to 12. I learned the basics and then forgot them all. I can figure out songs when I have the music but it is long and arduous. I want to learn to sight read better.

I've been taking piano lessons since last Spring. I stopped during the Summer and then picked it up again just before Thanksgiving. 

The big reason I decided to dive in again is that my teacher comes to the house on Mondays after I get off work. Before, I met him at Music City on Saturday afternoons. Breaking up my Saturdays like that was too intrusive. This works out great now.

My instructor is Art Rosenau. He is the organist at church and very very VERY talented.

I'm paying $20.00 for a one hour lesson.

Tonight, I paid $20.00 so Art could sit there and listen to me practice. I didn't sit down at the piano at all this past week. I have to make the effort to sit down and practice as soon as I get home.

I hope to make that happen this week.

Excellent Day

It has not been often in my life where I am on the side of a winning Championship team. But I can not ever say that again.

The Seattle Seahawks kicked some Denver butt today. I don't think anyone figured the game would be that lopsided. Seattle dominated from the very first play. Denver had maybe two good drives. 

We watched the game at the Hub and enjoyed the day immensely.

We started the day with church and then tried to do a few projects. Susan did very well with her stenciling.

I did okay with my storm window project.

We went to a neighbors house briefly to check out a remodel. Actually, our neighbors Tami and Lou bought a house down the block and are going to rent it to their niece.

We went through it back in November and it was pretty bad. It's remarkable what they have accomplished in four months. It makes us feel pretty inadequate.

We returned home with new remodeling vigor and did a little more work on our projects until it was time to walk over to the Hub to watch the game.

The Hub served barbecued ribs and chicken and taters and a mess of other good stuff, including beer...which we again enjoyed in copious amounts. Joining us for the game was Lee, Robin, Mark and the rest of the regulars at the Hub.

Afterwards, we returned home to take a hot tub and now we are just wondering what time to go to bed.

It's been a great day and a really good reminder of how blessed and lucky we are.

Ski Day

Today was our first day of skiing this season. The day was great as indicated by the following pictures.

As great as the day was, it also reminded us that we are old and out of shape. It didn't help that we drank copious amounts of beer towards the end of the day. And wasn't that last picture a bottle of some sort of peppermint elixir...or should I say a half bottle?

We got home and got into the hot tub to soothe our weary joints and muscles. Not long after that, we got into bed.