Icy Trees, Wet Roads

It stayed cold overnight but got up into the mid 30s (F) fairly early this morning. When I went out to the car, the sky was clear but it was &x201c;raining” under the trees and I got fairly wet. The ice that had coated everything yesterday was melting and coming off in largish pieces. I tried to take a picture of the Zelkova trees on Norbeck, which were glittering in the morning light, but it doesn’t really do the sight justice. The roads were wet, not at all slick, fortunately.

Snow In The Trees

We had another little snow fall this morning. When I checked early Montgomery County had decided on a two hour delay for schools. That hasn’t mattered much this year but I was planning to go in to do some things with the fifth grade. Because it was already scheduled to be a half day today, the delay meant school was canceled. Montgomery County decided to close, anyway, a little later. Cathy and I went to work together and had no problems with the snow. The roads were all fine. This is the view from the front of my office building, into the trees beside the parking lot, taken from a third floor window. There are a few mid-sized trees growing on the banks of a small stream. The thickets toward the top of the picture are brambles.

Broccolini and Burger

I’m afraid all I have for a photograph for today is another meal. This evening I decided to make burgers. I topped them with sauteed tomatoes and onions and then melted some Irish Dubliner cheese, which is something like cheddar but a bit more buttery and quite good. I had the burger sans-bun and paired it with some fresh broccolini, boiled briefly just until tender. Turned out pretty well, if I say so myself.

Before (The Old)

Mom sent an email this morning saying that her refrigerator was leaking water. The ice maker hasn’t worked for a while now but it’s still hooked up to the water supply. Unfortunately, it seems somewhere along the way there is a leak and the water is coming out onto the floor under it. She turned the water off at the mains but there is only so long you can have water off and still be considered to be living in modern America. I went there after work and pulled the frig out from the wall. Nothing obvious—the copper tubing comes out of the floor just where it meets the wall and didn’t seem to have any problems.

After (The New)

I took the panel off the base of the refrigerator back, exposing the compressor and the rest of the mechanical workings. When the water was turned back on, I could see the where the leak was, with water dripping from the plastic tubing just after where the copper tube is attached to the system. What to do. The most obvious thing was to find the other end of the copper tube and turn the water off there, to only the refrigerator. It took us a while to find but we finally did, behind the access panel of the upstairs bathroom. Unfortunately, that value wasn’t in very good shape and the handle broke off before I was able to even start to turn it. We ran out to Strosniders and bought a new valve and in a fairly short time I had it replaced. The water is now turned off and all seems well.

Lake Needwood in Snow and Ice

It was quite cool this morning. My phone said it was 1°F here and my car agreed. There was a bit of wind, which made it seem a little cooler but the sun was shining and it was a beautiful day. I had to drop some papers off at the school so I went to work via Lake Needwood. It’s covered in snow and I stopped to take a few photographs before continuing on to the office. Fortunately, the roads are clear because I needed to drive to Richmond later in the day and bring Dorothy home for a short visit.

Fjords

So, have I had a trip to the International Space Station where I took this black and white photo of fjords? Well, no, obviously. As you probably guessed, this is a close up of wet and salt encrusted pavement. But to me it does look a bit like an aerial photograph.

This was in the parking lot at work and the patterns were quite varied and (to me) interesting.

Fresh Snow

We had a small snow squall again overnight and this morning. By midday the sun was out and it was quite beautiful. The roads were never terribly bad but because I had no meetings and what I needed to get done today I could do just as easily from home, I stayed and worked from here.

In the afternoon I cleared the walk and the drive and then went around the yard taking pictures of the snow. It’s notoriously hard to get interesting pictures of snow. It’s sort of white on white, but these footprints that were in the show and that were mostly covered by this recent fall make for nice shadows. Personally I’m not tired of winter yet, although I know some people are. It’s only February, folks.