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Weather
We now own a snow blower.
It took many years and many feet of snow, but I’ve finally given in and we got our first snow blower.
I picked it up at Lowe’s earlier today and it barely fit into my car. But it rode in the passenger’s seat quite nicely.
It turns out snow blowers are harder to find in February than you’d think. They’ve all been replaced by grills! I first stopped at Home Depot and they only had two left; and they were way to big.
This little guy should work well at clearing our drive way and, more importantly, the end where the snowplow plows us in.
My 2010 Blizzard Photos
The 2010 blizzard is over and the digging out is underway. It took us 2 hours to get a decent path cleared and who knows how long it would have taken us to shovel the whole thing. Lucky for us, we have good neighbors.
It’s days like today that remind us how great of neighbors we have. Not one but two offered to clear out our driveway with their snowblower.
Here are a few of the photos I took. We had about 16 inches with drifts up to 4 feet and not to mention the crud the snowplow puts at the end of the driveway.
Are There Any Great Weather Apps For The Mac?
I’m a big fan of the weather, but I lack a great desktop weather app for my Mac.
I have WeatherDock which is decent. However, it basically just shows the temp and forecast. No radar, and nothing special. It is however the one I use most.
WeatherDock
Meteorologist was cool back in the day but I haven’t checked it out lately. Seems like it’s back to life so that’s on my list of possibilities. It seems to have a good mix of the basics, some details and a radar.
Meteorologist
Get Weather Alerts via Twitter
Lets face it, some of us are on Twitter more than we are paying attention to most other forms of communication. We can tell you what was recently blogged, but we sometimes have no idea what’s going on outside our window with the weather. Wouldn’t it be nice to get them to come to you, via Twitter? Now you can.
I’ve used a combination of dlvr.it and Weather.gov weather alert feeds to post updates to Twitter. Now when a storm is coming, I can know!
Ice Block Candle Holder
Our neighbor gave us this ice block candle holder for Christmas. She actually made it herself too!
It’s one large block of ice that has some berries and Christmas tree pieces frozen in it. She said that it took a few times to get right as the weather was to cold and the ice was freezing to fast. This was the first one that turned out and it’s extremely cool!
It now sits out on our front step for all to enjoy.
Taking Pictures of Lightning
When severe storms rolled into my hometown of Chatfield the other night, they can with a great lightning show. So, I decided to try and catch some action on my camera.
Now, I’ve tried this before and it’s not an easy task unless your camera is setup to automatically take a picture every few seconds. Mine isn’t, but I was still able to get a few great shots due to the large amount of lighting and lots of patients.
Most of my 200 pictures turned out like this:
However, I did manage to catch lightning a few times:
What’s wrong with this picture?
This is our backyard, can you tell what’s wrong with this picture?
What if I said I live in Minnesota? What if I said we are in the mist of a severe drought?
For some reason, there are parts of our lawn that are bright green and don’t dry out. Not even in a severe drought. I haven’t watered but I did have to mow today and it just doesn’t make sense. How can lawns and crops be dying across the state and parts of our backyard is alive and well!
Weather Photos – Waconia MN 06-20-07
Yesterday, severe storms ran across the area and prompted tornado warnings for us. I was actually out watching these storms roll in as the sirens sounded. No tornadoes, but some brief decent sized hail, lots of pea sized hail and some rain and wind did come out of them.
My ‘Best Free Mac Applications’ List
On the Mac, there are some fantastic applications that are completely free. Here is a list of what I believe to be some of the best I’ve found so far.
- Adium – The all in one, completely customizable instant messaging program. It absolutely rocks!
- AOL Radio – I love this because I can get nearly commercial free streaming music from all genres.
- AppFresh* – Only free while in development, AppFresh keeps me up-to-date on what installed programs are not up-to-date.
- Butler – Applications & Folders in the menu bar are so handy. Plus it can do so much more.
I Survived Insanity Atop the Stratosphere Tower!
Our Vegas trip is over and the 85 degree days have been replaced with a 28 degree Minnesota day. It’s good to be home again, but it’s to darn cold.
While out in Vegas I got to ride the rides at the top of the Stratosphere tower and the rides are relatively lame, but on top of a skyscraper, they are amazing. Each one sits over 100 stories above the ground and just the thought of them makes most people scared.
