Fire!

Between the cold wet grass, the gray skies, the fired up dog, the smoke, and of course the flames from the massive pile of sticks and limbs Blizzie decided to stay in her basket today.
Hubby has been on fire in the yard this year! He and the bobcat have two piles of ice storm debris like this, and a third yet to be compiled.
This one is clearly viewed from the house so I was delighted when I peeked out the window and saw it ablaze!
Fire is fascinating. I love my pellet stove, and the pellet fire is cool to watch, but wood fire is mesmerizing. The pops, hisses, snakes, and sizzles just add to the effect!
Hubby is the firemaster. I help move some of the smaller sticks but he just throws tree limbs about without a second thought of the heat!
Polar had a great time! He loves to hang out with us. He did wish we had hot dogs though... come to think of it so did I!
It was a perfect night for a bonfire. It was chilly and has been cold and rainy the past couple of days. Nice to hang out in the warm glow!
Impressed that hubby got it burned down by 11:00pm. About six hours- just right! The ice storm is fading into my memory.

Ice Storm- Our home

Scroll to next posts for slide shows! There are two of them!
On the Thursday before last I went to the town X-mas party and was having a great time, but knew that I had to get on the road to do a deposit (tax time, of course!) before it got any worse outside. The prediction was for an ice storm. It had been freezing rain all day. The road agents said I would be fine, but I stopped at home to see if Art could take me. He could. We headed back up and had a great turkey dinner (turkey was on sale after Thanksgiving). I had also gotten a lovely bottle of wine at the Yankee Swap that day. We had dinner at about 7:00 and settled in to tube. The brownouts started immediately, so we downshifted to reading and knitting after getting out flashlights- just in case... The first fire call for a branch on a wire came in a little after that. By 11:00 pm the power was out all over town. By three am Art could not get to the fire station because of downed trees. The next day I lit the wood (pellet) cook stove for coffee and breakfast then kept it going all day for heat. I am getting pretty good at cooking on it and regulating the temperature. I even baked in it for the first time! Delish!

It wasn't that terribly cold out- maybe 25 or thirty. Art was gone all day clearing trees with his Bobcat, and responding to calls. Later that day he headed down the hill in the 4x4 to get gas for our generator and extras for the FD. He had to go all the way to Nashua and waited in line about three hours. The next day Art's sis and her family showed up with their lizards as they had no power at home. We had fun playing risk, and drinking hot cocoa. My nephew S loved playing with Blizzie, Polar, and the chickens. He memorized all of the chicken's names, even! Very fun :-)We had our generator wired up so that we would have power in the basement for the pellet boiler and water pump, four outlets in the garage, the fridge, kitchen outlet, and kitchen lights (which we didn't remember until Sunday night!LOL!. That with the wood cook stove kept us in a simple but comfortable lifestyle. The next days were a blur of fire and rescue calls, volunteering at the warming shelter, keeping our house going...

Blizzie found a new comfy place! Under the cook stove. Must be toasty warm- and no one would reach under the hot stove to get her!Art got a line on some generators midweek and headed off to New York just as it began to snow. I did a double shift at the school the first night he was gone after having the midnight to four am shift the night before. Some friends stopped by at about midnight and because I was so excited about the MP hummers riding around town they asked if we could get inside to see it. They were great! Big kudos to the help the National Guard is giving our town first of all! Then to let us take pictures and poke our head through the roof to get the gunner's view :) Happy happy! Then after two hours of sleep had to hitch a ride with one of our guys to do end of the year inventory, as well as keep the generator going for our house. Luckily it was only about three or four inches so I didn't even bother shoveling. Thursday a second snow storm rolled in dropping about six inches overnight, then about eight more on Friday. This added Bobcat duties to Art's roster. Here we are on Sunday with another snowstorm, a Nor'Easter, that will drop another foot to foot and a half of snow. We got our power and internet back last night. We still have about 30% of our town without power.

We just keep plugging away! Our town budget is blown to you know where, and the fire department has been operating on fumes and donations! It has been a challenge for sure. I am impressed with how well people pulled together to help each other out, to clear the roads, and take care of those who needed it.

I do recall wishing for a white christmas!! LOL! Be careful what you wish for!

Ice Storm- On the roads...

Route 101 (our main East West road) in state was closed for a day and a half. Most other roads were closed including the state route through our town for many more days. Even when you could get out you had to skirt around fallen trees, down power lines, as well as fallen poles and transformers. The scariest things to drive under were the trees that had fallen on wires but were still suspended fifteen to thirty feet in the air. Our fd was working long days to help clear the roads, as well as help folks with generators, fallen trees on their homes, and we set up a 24 hour a day warming shelter at the local elementary. Somehow I always ended up with the overnight shifts :(> I can't even remember which day now, but we also had a house fire in there somewhere...

Ice Storm 2008- First days

Many had trees hit their house. This is a garage of a friend with a 15"+ diameter tree through it! They also had another through a kennel, another on a temporary garage, and two trees rip not only the wires but the boxes off of their home.
Forests look like a box of broken toothpicks, even though they are fifty foot tall trees snapped in half, or ripped right out of the ground roots and all.
This was the most impressive/devastating tree damage I witnessed. It looks like it had a stake driven down from the top center down to the ground. Shredding it and spreading it out 360... Trunk was probably three or four feet in diameter.