It's COLD !!!!

I said in my last post that I would take a photo of this area of the yard after the night and day of rain that was in the forecast this past weekend, before dropping to single digit temperatures for our highs. So there it is ... higher ground, snow was gone and hard as a rock. It was 7° when I took this photo on Monday morning with a "feels like" -11. That was yesterday morning, not today.

So I am sitting here the morning to start this post around 8:40am CT, with a hot cup of coffee, 5° outside and a "feels like" -5°. This is the last day of single temps before it slightly warms up tomorrow with a high of 15° and moves back up to our normal winter averages of 30/40s ... it will feel like a heat wave. 

Walter is the only one of the five that does not chew frozen snow nor does he have any interest in doing that. Yet he goes to the door to be let out when he needs to go. He isn't out there long but gets the job done and sprints back to the door to be let in. Henry, Watson and Ava have to be bribed with the words "milk bone" for them to come back inside. They do not care how cold it is outside. 

Cletus is not a fan of this weather. Oh he will go outside, chew ice, eat snow and do what he needs to do but there are a few times during the day as I open the patio door to let them all out, he does a U-turn and lets me know he doesn't need to go outside that bad. He is still skinny but is gaining weight slowly but surely. That mark on his neck when I got him, from either a rope or chain abuse when tied up, is completely gone and the hair has grown back. He has been here two months already ... a fantastic bloodhound and am glad I picked him up.

With these kind of temperatures not much was done outside. Yesterday was Inauguration Day plus MLK Day so I did not need to go to the mailbox to collect all my junk mail that is delivered before I put it in my recycling bin. The driveway, sidewalk was cleared and there was a light see through ice layer over the front yard grass. I actually slipped walking on that front yard yesterday but stayed upright. 

With high anticipation I turned on the tv while fixing breakfast, very early, because I wanted to watch all the news about the inauguration. I watched everything about it on tv up to 6:30pm when the College Football Championship Game started, then I would flip back and forth during commercials during the football game. Way too many commercials in college football games. 

I won't discuss it, or argue with comments where you are free to say what you want as they will all be published ... but I loved every thing Trump did on Day 1. I agree with every Executive Order he signed and every Tariff that starts February 1. I found it more interesting to look off into the crowd as he spoke to watch the reactions of Biden, Harris, both Clintons and Bush. They were classic responses.

In the photo pictured I want you to remember that low hanging Astound Internet cable you see ... I had a shocking surprise yesterday afternoon.

It was the normal nightly routine the past few days .... the players remained the same but only the seats changed. They are luckily very cooperative when the seats change, no fighting for their favorite seat as they just look and find one open if their favorite seat is taken.

While watching Trump's Inauguration Speech, I was interrupted by all the dogs and hounds waking up and sprinting to the living room windows. Watson and Cletus were screaming their perfect bloodhound bays like we were being invaded. Ava and Walter was barking to keep any intruders off their lawn and Henry as usual was looking out the window, wagging his tail in anticipation of meeting a new friend.

I was shocked!!!

After 7 months was Astound Internet going to ratchet their cable from a little over 5' above the ground back up to the height of the Spectrum and AT&T cables???? I am two for two now when filing a BBB complaint ... those complaints produce action by companies ignoring me and jobs are finished. I note those on my "2024 Storm Repair" spreadsheet in bold red font. 

After Trump's speech I grabbed my Nikon 3500 with the Tamron 28-200mm lens and stood at my bedroom window shooting these photos through a closed window with a screen window on the outside of it. I glanced at my watch ... it was 13°.

From last summers experience with Spectrum and AT&T cables, I know all they needed was that machine that would ratchet the low hanging cable tighter and a little straighter. It would not take them long to finish the job. But it sure was cold for two men working on this work order.

When I saw one of the men open the truck door, I walked out the front door without a coat, across my frozen front yard to thank them for getting the job done after seven plus months. I wanted to tell him how much I appreciated he and his co-worker working in weather like this. He understood what I had been going through. We talked for quite a while since it was his lunch break. They still had some other work to do on their cable that pole for lines going the opposite way.

Earlier Cletus was giving him his best bloodhound bay from deep inside his throat. He really does have the perfect bay just like I was told in November when I picked him up. I went to the patio door with my iPhone in hand and just like that ... the low hanging cable was in fact higher than its original position based on photos last year. Spectrum on top, AT&T in the middle and then Astound. 

Their cable was straight all the way to my utility pole. They only worked from my neighbor's utility pole to straighten over 200ft of cable. Once the temperature gets back to normal averages where it's in the 40s in the afternoons I am going to start cutting up down those fallen trees, cut down some of the  smaller trees and cut the bushes that grow on that berm. I'd love to burn that berm after it is cut but I am afraid of an amber jumping the berm into that cornfield and starting the field on fire.

I know it is probably a good time of year to do that but I am not taking any chances, so I will either pay someone to haul all the trees away and bush hog the berm. 

After a few days of heavy use, I can give the Dirty Dog Doormats a 4-star review. The only reason I would not give them a 5 star review is on tile the door mat slide when their description says they won't slide. I had to put that one over the old rug I had in front of the patio door. When all five are running from outside to inside, even those long 5' mats would slide a little on the laminate flooring ... but there is almost 600 pounds of dogs and hounds sprinting over those mats, so why wouldn't they slide a little as they turned the corner.

Absorption was as good as advertised. With the yard really wet from the rain and melting snow over the weekend, these mats picked up the majority of wetness off the paws as they walked over them. If they stood on them to sniff, all the better ... very little paw tracking was seen on the floors after they came in.

$47 for the smaller door mat and $99 for the longer 5' mats .. well worth the money. I would highly recommend them if you need to keep your floors clean from wet/muddy dog/hound paws. 

When I mentioned to my friend up the street I was looking at houses in the "hill country" of Texas north of Houston, he told his old friend that does live in the "hill country" of Texas north of San Antonio. He sent me this photo yesterday plus he understands my reasoning. 

But like a reader said in comments in the last post, that I might want to put that file away showing houses for sale and watch football instead, I did that and heard myself repeating every time I made a trip from the couch to the fridge to restock while watching NFL games over the weekend .... "you are really going to move over one thing, a flooding backyard?"

So the urge to look and the urge to move floated away into my memory banks. After his suggestion I went back through my private blog for every year, near this date in January ... I had those same "moving thoughts" then as I did the other day. I need to remember that. 

This morning I hear my phone notifying me that I have a text. It is from my friend up the street sending me two photos that he received this morning from his friend in that high country in Texas. It's rare but what is going on today with those severe winter weather warning sweeping through the southern states. 

That much snow wouldn't bother me, nor a few days of cold temps. I had the same sometimes in Sierra Vista but both the snow and cold temperatures wouldn't last long. 

Last night while watching the football game and looking at my sleeping hounds and dogs I had a sad thought. Ava is one year old as of two days ago but all the rest will be 4 and 5 years old this summer. Oh, Walter's is February 1st and it's been a fast 5 years for him. The sad thought was ... they don't live forever and based on those I have had since 1987, 12 years is about max and some didn't make 10 years old.

I would be five to seven years older, stiffer, possibly less energy and more grumpier when the hounds and dogs pass away. Although my dad never stopped doing what I do now to maintain a house and yard, until he passed at 89 years old. Still I might not be in the mood to break up ice after shoveling the snow on top five to seven years from now.

I had a flash thought that once I get down to one dog, mostly likely Ava ... I would sell this place and head for a nice condo where someone else does the maintenace, the landscaping etc. After another tv timeout for the game another thought ... "I will stay here until I die".

So who knows. LOL

College football is over for another season. I will tune into some college basketball but I never watch 14 hours of that in a day like I do college football on a Saturday. NFL playoffs are getting interesting so I watched all the games this past weekend for the first time all year. Baseball is right around the corner.

So things are pretty normal for January here in "the tropics" of Southern Indiana.