Posts Tagged With: ice

Like Dew, Only Frozen

Posted on January 25, 2010 by Quill Gordon

On mild days, moisture is drawn from the snow pack into the air. Relatively speaking, warm air holds more moisture than cool so as temperatures drop at night some of that moisture is released as condensation. And if the object upon which that moisture condenses has been chilled to below freezing, frost will form on its surface.

Freezing fog (Beware the Pogonip!) can create frost and has its own eerie beauty but the best examples of frost are seen when the sky is clear and radiational cooling seems to suck the heat out of everything, hurling it out past the stars and into deep space. Delicate filigrees disappear quickly when the warmth of the sun takes over and by the time most people get up the show is over. Continue reading →

Categories: nature, Rural Life, Vermont | Tags: frost, ice, january thaw, pogonip, Rural Life, Vermont, winter | Leave a comment

Eskimo Blue Day

Posted on December 19, 2009 by Quill Gordon

Sometimes when the cold winter wind screams, seeming to carry nothing but cruelty and pain, it can seem like the best thing to do is scream back. Feet planted and shoulders squared, lean in and let loose with a howl, a yowl or a yelp. Play with the tone and vary the pitch, high, low or otherwise, but always, always keep the volume right where it should be, turned up all the way to 11. Continue reading →

Categories: nature, Rural Life, Vermont | Tags: death in the woods, ice, nature, quill gordon, Rural Life, snow, Vermont, winter | 1 Comment

The Crunchy Time of Year

Posted on January 13, 2009 by Quill Gordon

Daylight lengthens but the cold deepens, even as Earth’s northern hemisphere begins tilting again toward the sun. Shadows retreat southward, slowly, day by day, and the sun peers over the ridge of the barn roof but, due to a seasonal lag, it will be some time yet before more sun means more warmth. This is the cold time.

Just how deep and vicious the cold will be remains to be seen. Whether it will be a long, protracted spell or wave after bitter wave of chill air is still a matter of conjecture but one thing is for sure: the cold is coming and it is time to get ready or go away.

windowfrost2

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Categories: nature, Rural Life, Vermont | Tags: ice, nature, Rural Life, snow, Vermont, winter | 7 Comments

Solar Powered Roof Rake

Posted on March 7, 2008 by Quill Gordon

Thoroughly exhausted from a day of raking roofs, I slogged through deep, heavy snow for 45 minutes to reach the last of the roofs to rake. After a short rest to catch my breath and have a smoke, I put the pieces of my roof rake together and got to work, only to find that the blade skittered and bounced harmlessly off the thick layer of ice that had developed on top of the thick layer of snow. I lunged and swung and pulled and yanked until I was left with little more than a strip of bent, twisted aluminum on the end of a stick, and after that I sat down and cursed. Continue reading →

Categories: Humor, Rural Life, Vermont | Tags: Humor, ice, nature, roof rake, Rural Life, snow, Vermont, winter | 9 Comments

A Mystery

Posted on January 13, 2008 by Quill Gordon

A bit of January thaw has reduced the snow cover, up here at Fish in a Barrel Pond, to nearly nothing. This is not such a bad thing, though, as I found that shovel I lost before Christmas, when I plowed it deep into a snow bank.

When I was in town the other day, the giant piles of snow in the parking lots were gone but I could tell where they had been by the leaves and other debris the plows had swept up and deposited. Debris like a $20.00 bill.

Score.

But every now and then I find some thing I just can’t explain, like this mouse. Did a predator drop him here? He doesn’t look beat-up enough to me so I don’t think that’s it. There are no tracks around him, either, but I have a theory.

Continue reading →

Categories: Humor, Vermont | Tags: fall down, freezing rain, Humor, ice, mouse, thaw, Vermont, winter | 7 Comments