On Saturday, we enjoyed the cold weather by marching around in the snow on our snowshoes. See my digital scrapbook page photos of our second day of snowshoeing over on my other blog here.
On Saturday evening, we had a lovely dinner out with friends in Ardmore, PA (Cafe' San Pietro). We headed home to watch the Philadelphia Eagles lose their playoff game. : (
On Sunday, we awoke in the morning to a misty cold rain falling and streets so slick that we could barely walk to the end of our front sidewalk to get to the car. BOO HOO... because we were due to drive one of my sons and another student back to UPitt for the spring semester. The drive is about 4 hours right across the entire state of Pennsylvania, USA from Philly to Pittsburgh.
While loading the car, a woman came barreling down the street in her car, failed to stop at the stop sign, continued on to our street and whacked straight into the curb, toppling the stop sign near our house and halting only feet from the tail end of our mini van. UGH. She was able to move her car and the stop sign was off it's bolts but mainly undamaged. At that point we decided to wait til the streets warmed up a bit to leave the house.
Four hours later, we got a very late start and headed off to the interstate (PA Turnpike I76). The roads were fine, but a constant icy rain fell for more than 3 hours of the trip. We (and other motorists) were forced to stop often to bang (and I mean hard) the icy buildup off our windows, windshield wipers, headlights and hood (bonnet to you UKers). The temps hovered around freezing, visibility was bad. UGH again. After stopping for the 4th time to whack off the ice, the windshield wiper came off it's broken hinge. Fortunately we were at a travel stop (as opposed to the roadside) and I begged the mini mart cashier for a few paperclips which my husband finagled to hold on the wiper blade. Yes - a bit scary.
Fortunately, the wipers were working MUCH better with the new clip! Still the ice and rain fell.
At some point, we came out of a mountain tunnel and there was no rain on the other side of the tunnel - whew! We made it to PITT the rest of the way with dry weather. When we arrived at PITT and dropped the kids at their perspective dorms, the weather was a balmy 50degreesF (that's about 10 Celsius).
By then it was 6:30pm or so. Hubby and I now had to begin a 5 hour trek BACK to Philly. Ugh Ugh. The weather prediction for Pitt was that it would drop temps thru the evening, be 21 degrees by 1am and start snowing. The next two days were due to be frigid temps. Frigid as in 2 degrees F (minus 15 C). Yes - seriously cold. We stopped at an EatNPark in Somerset, PA for a great soup and salad meal and watched the last few mins of the GreenBay vs. SanFran playoff game at an outdoor stadium in Wisconsin, USA where it was reported to be some 40degrees below freezing!
We encountered all kinds of crazy weather on the way back to Philly, dropping temps, fog so thick that London UK probably looked sunny in comparison, had to drive 20mph w/ flashers on and still couldn't see (for hours!). When we got near home, the fog was still around and it started to POUR, further decreasing visibility. YIKES. Just after midnight we had finally made it home. Crazy right?
Throughout the day on Monday, temps fell and by Tuesday morning (yesterday) it was 2degreesF /minus 18C when I got up - 5degrees when I drove my son to school (it's a mile away so I thought it was just too cold for a walk). The weather stayed cold all day yesterday not making it much above 12degreesF. I felt sorry for the trash men who were collecting yesterday. Last night and the night before, we set out kitchen sink to a super slow drip so the pipes wouldn't freeze (part of the kitchen pipe travels uninsulated towards the basement and is known to freeze).
This week I discovered that my programmable indoor thermostat reads 10 degrees WARMER (above picture shows the thermometer I stole out of the fridge to test the house temp) than my actual house temp - omg, no wonder I'm always so cold, wearing hat and gloves around the house. House thermometer was set to 70degrees F - house was struggling to stay at 60! Thermometer on thermostat said the house had reached the proposed 70F temp (NOT).
Last night as I sat by the fire (which never felt as hot as usual) and crocheted this:
while watching episode 1 of season 4 Downton Abbey followed by a few episodes of London Hospital.
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| stole the thermometer out of the fridge to check the house temps. |
I noticed that our den and den toilet were super cold. I took the thermostat in there and discovered it was only 50degreesF inside that room. The dial of the thermostat on the wall was no longer able to turn and the baseboard radiators were cold, no heat coming through. Guess we'll need to replace that thermostat.
So today the weather reaches a high of 25degreesF (minus 5 Celsius). Tomorrow, 32F, Friday 39F and Saturday 55F with rain!!!! What a whirlwind of weather! What's it like where you are?
2 comments:
As I'm just a short trot from you I know your pain well of wearing hats and scarves IN your house. And I know the road to Pitt like the back of my hand (my dad's from there). I enjoyed reading somebody else's take on that drive :)
Here,in North Wales.UK,it has been a fairly quiet grey day.Britain is being battered by huge winds,masses of rain and high tides.Large areas of the country are flooded and there is the promise of more rain to come.The land is just saturated with water and there is nowhere for it to go.Fortunately we live up a hill so never have any worries.More bad weather is on its way coming from your direction!Let's hope it isn't as bad as you have been having.Crocheting a blanket does help to keep you warm though,doesn't it?
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