Last couple of days

This is what our Sunday looked like in front of our house. The snow came down so quickly that by the time I had a path shoveled, the walkway behind me was already covered. There were not too many people out on the road. This was a good thing because I'm not sure a snow plow was down our road until the afternoon.

If you are interested, more pictures of the storm can be seen at my Flickr account.

Today, Cathie and I were sitting eating lunch at the kitchen table when we heard some birds screeching outside. I went out to investigate and saw some birds in the trees fighting and yelling at each other.

I went back inside and got my camera. Since we have a second floor porch, I went out there to see if I could get some good pictures. This was the best one I could get. I am not sure if he was the instigator or not, but there were also blue jays and another bird that resembled a Flicker (Real long beak) flying at each other.

Our Personal Frozen Tundra

This is our backyard. It is completely frozen solid. I spent over 15 minutes with a garden pick trying to chop the ice so we had a pathway to our cars. I never made it deep enough to reach our cement patio pad. I only made it about 3 inches deep and still have another 2 or 3 inches to go. I also only made it about 10 feet out of about 80 or so feet. Instead, I gave up and decided to take a few pictures of items around the yard frozen in place.


This is a Fisher Price bicycle that my boys parked near the swing set. As you can see, it is not going anywhere for a while.


This soccer ball was under the swing set. Now, it only peeks out of it snow prison waiting for spring to come and have someone play with it again.


Here is the bicycle from above as well as another bike.

Today, it reached 40 degrees. I thought a lot of the ice would melt. Unfortunately, next to nothing melted.

Frederick, Maryland on the Rocks

I finally decided to dig out my car yesterday since I had to go get rations for the family unit from the store. The first thing I noticed after our snow/sleet/freezing rain event was that my 180 lb. frame was not sinking in the "snow." Instead, I have a nice ice rink in my back yard. Feeling how hard the surface was, I knew I was in for a big task getting the car out at this point.

When I got to my car, I noticed that it had about 5 inches of an ice mixture stuck to it. Notice there are no foot indentations going to my door and the accumulation is up to my rims. The above picture was taken AFTER I walked around the car, "scraping" the ice off the roof, trunk, windows, and hood.

Now that the car was cleared off, it was now time to get it unstuck. I initially attempted to just put the car in gear and "rock" the car out of its resting place. This was a technique learned during the winters in Erie, PA. This was unsuccessful. Instead, it drew the attention of a neighbor kid who was willing to help. My first thought was that this kid would slip and fall on the ice as I was backing up. It turned out okay and there were no casualties.

Finally, after the neighbor kid and I dug out my front tires, I got the car moved. To my surprise, the car did not make deep tracks in the snow as I reversed out of my parking space. Instead, it drove ON TOP of the snow. My 1999 Honda Accord was sitting on the snow and not sinking in it. We were both amazed and had never seen such a sight. In my 20 some winters up north, I had never experienced anything of this nature. WOW!

This last picture just shows the tire resting on the snow with no indentations surrounding it.

I'm still in awe of this. Can you tell?

Celebrating the number 100

Friday was a special celebration for my son at school. It was the 100th day of the school year.

This post is a special marker for me since it is my 100th post on this blog.

So, in celebration of these two events, I thought that I would post some art my son did at school on Friday. His hat has 10 circles and each circle has 10 unique items drawn in them.

Today is also my half way point in the computer programming class that I am taking. I finished my mid-term last night. My brain is mush today from psuedocodes and structure charts and flow charts.

Now we start the week preparing for a possible blizzard moving in Monday and Tuesday. No one is posting accumulation numbers, but let's hope it is not the 100+ inches they saw in New York state this past week. 6-12 inches would do nicely, though. At least the kids would love it!

Duck Colors

Duck -- Humphrey's Half Moon Inn
Originally uploaded by louhamilton23.

These ducks were so tame that you could walk right up to them. I was probably 18 inches or so from them when I took this picture.

I love the color of this male (drake), the green seems to change colors with the angle that you look at him.

The female (duck) has a nice brown color to her, as well. However, it just is not the same boldness as the drakes color.

Pacific Portal at Shelter Island

I know that I haven't posted in a few days but I've been in San Diego for work. Although it was a business trip, I did have a chance to see a few sites. My Flickr account will be updated later this weekend with pictures from the trip.


This is the Pacific Shelter on Shelter Island in Point Loma. It was right across the street from the hotel where I stayed. Pacific Shelter is a sculptural gazebo. It was designed by James Hubbell and constructed for a May 2006 opening celebration. The structure is sprayed concrete with mosaic tile detailing. The adjacent trellis has concrete columns, timber beams and wrought iron ornamentation.