Phoney problems

March 12, 2007 (4:35pm)
41º F, Partly cloudy, SSE wind 3 mph.

Good afternoon,

just back from uptown and the bank thermometer indicated 58º F! First time I have seen that this year I think. The snow covered fields a re turning to water covered fields. In the last couple of days, the warm has really made the snow disappear. The 18" of show cover is now down to less than 6" in our yard. The snowbank piled up by the snowplow at the mailbox at the end of the drive, was about 6" higher than the box and now is about 2 feet lower. Melting is really happening too fast and will cause some problems down the road. The soil finally did freeze and all of the water is lying on the surface. Eventually the snow banks will melt, allowing all of the water to flow out, or it will turn everything to mud - especially our driveway. Oh well. We each have a pair of knee-boots if we need them.

Our computers have been causing problems for a bit. Slowly, they have had more and more problems with internet line speed. Seems to be a periodic problem, happening the last time about a month ago. Before the speed slowed down too much, I was able to get an email out on Saturday to the phone company asking for their repair folks to look at it. They did come out this morning, the first guy found the line from the first junction box to the main line to be faulty. He change the line to a different one, already in place, but he still got some very poor readings. His only solution was to ask the company to send out a different class of repair folks to work on the underground lines.

An hour after he left, I tried to contact the phone company via their website. Instead of completing the connection and the maze of questions to get online with them, the line dropped and I could not get back on again. Checking the phone, it too was down. Figured that either the line had finally died or someone was working on it. As it turned out, the latter was true. A few minutes later, repairman came walking up the driveway (he didn’t want to get stuck in the snow). He was not a line technician, but the same as the first guy with 37 more years of experience. His testing snowed the problem had been corrected and he got good readings. Since, the speed has improved and no dropped connections since. Hope it stays that way.

This has been a persistent problem periodically since I have had internet. At least once a year, I need someone come and find the problem, to get it repaired. The last time it happened, the weather was similar, with a lot of melting snow and wet. I am not able to remember if similar conditions happened during each of the others, but suspect they were. Hope it will happen often enough for them to replace the lines or some such, permanently ending the problem. It sure is a pain when it happens.

I did have to chuckle at the first guy who came. Every time he walked to the connection box out in the woods, he took a different route, through fresh wet snow. My thought was he must be a city dude not used to walking in the woods. Sure enough he is. Talking to the second guy, he said he had just moved here from Milwaukee. The second guy also got all twisted up coming in here and tried to tell me the end of the main line was at our neighbors to the north. We don’t have any in that direction, at least with a junction box. No matter how hard I tried to convince him otherwise, he insisted, almost getting angry with me. I finally gave up. Later, he noticed Winding Road through the woods and asked where it went. I told him that was the road he came in on. At first he started to argue that too, but saw that maybe he had been wrong. Had to explain it one more time and he finally got it. So .... I got a chuckle from each of the two guys, but the system seems to work as it should now.

I intended to get things some squared away in the van, but snow in the driveway at that point had turned to glare ice. It was slippery enough that I was having a hard time standing up. Finally gave up, about the time the first repairman came. I did try to replace the windshield wiper blades (finally) only to discover I had bought the wrong refills some time ago. We are heading to Green Bay tomorrow, so will trade them in on the right ones. Managed to mangle the old rear one enough so that I cannot put it back on again. Took the whole arm off, so now it is back to the way rear windows used to be years ago. That will change tomorrow!

For some reason, the gasoline price in Kewaunee has stayed the same - 5¢/gallon below everywhere else in this part of the state. While I like to leave my money in the local economy, it isn’t always possible. When the price is 5¢/gallon below here, I will buy it somewhere else. It is not something I like to do, but need to do. The predicted price is supposed to rise more and stay high during the summer. Not happy about that at all. Still think they are too high, but what do I know other than the oil companies making huge profits.

I was noticing today that there are a number of birds coming back. Many were out souring in the light winds and making noise. Especially the crows. Also saw a couple of red-tailed hawks. Don’t remember seeing them this early. The snowmobilers are pretty much finished with their season too. It was a short one this year, maybe two weeks. Talked to one of our members at church yesterday and he said the snow in Upper Michigan was about as bad as here. Not normal. He went skiing. There was enough snow this time, but a few weeks ago he went to Porcupine Mountains and there was very little natural snow there. That is about unheard of, since they are right on the Superior lakeshore there. Not a normal year.

Time to get a-going.

In Christ My Saviour,

Chris <><