Snow, snow, snap and snow....

March 5th... It was March 5th.  Spring should be in the air.  The only thing in the air yesterday was snow.. and lot of snow.

It was a nasty week.  Started out on Sunday with snow coming down at the end of Sunday School and my opting to go home.  It snowed lightly all day and then turned to sleet and then finally a coating of ice over everything.  It was supposed to be followed by rain to wash it all away, but the rain never happened.

Monday the sun came out and "poof" it all melted.

Monday night was a repeat of Sunday and woke up to less snow, but sleet and ice everywhere.  Once again the rain that was to come did not appear.  I opted not to plow, hoping that the sun would appear and melt it all again.  No sun, some melting on Tuesday.

Wednesday I plowed frozen slush/slop as noted in the previous post.

Thursday I woke up, expecting to see snow on the ground.  There was a light coating but the snow was coming down and within a couple of hours there was a good three to four inches of snow.  So I went out for round one of plowing.  The forecast was for 7 to 10 inches of snow and at the rate that it was falling, that would be no problem.

I had noted on Wednesday that the nylon strap in the plow winch that raises and lowers the plow had evidence of the beginning of a rip.  The plow was purchased the winter after my late husband bought his truck.  It is a 2004 pickup and he bought the SnowBear Personal Snow Plow from BJ's that fall.  It was the display model of the plow that they were no longer carrying.  He went over the contents in the box with a fine tooth comb and everything was there.  It was greatly discounted and scanned at checkout even lower, so it was a bargain.  Likely a 2003 model of the plow, so the plow is likely 12 years old.  It has plowed many flakes of snow into large piles over the last 10 years of use.  So every year I have done the plowing I have been waiting to see some wear and tear on the strap and it appeared this week.

I went out for a second round of plowing around 5:00 PM.  The snow had finally stopped and the temeratures were already falling.  It was to get to 4 degrees and the snow would have been uber solid.  On the third pass from the driveway, I hit the button to raise the plow blade and nothing happened.  I moved the truck away from the highway and got out.  Sure enough, there were now two straps... one attached to the plow and one attached to the motor.

I debated about what to do and decided that I still needed to plow and since the plow rests on the ground, which is where it was, I would be able to continue the work.  So I finished the task.  The only difference is that when I backed up, I was scraping snow behind the plow, so there were little mounds of snow left behind from the backward plowing.  But it got the job finished.

This morning I had to go out and plow once again to get the drifting snow and the plowed snow that had been pushed along the front area.  The plow did it's job.  And now the sun is melting the snow that remained.  Everyday it will be getting warmer until it is in the 50's next week.

I have a new strap coming from Pittsburgh.  Danny says he thinks he can replace it and I should be good for another few years.  So until that happens, the truck will be stuck in the driveway.  But at least, I can still move snow with it.

I am really tired of this winter.  Not as much snow as I got last year, but it just keeps coming and coming and coming.  Hopefully this is the last of the significant snow.  And all that is left are the light spring snows, know in this area as 'onion snow'.  Keeping good thoughts!!