The freezing rain and ice storm has finally passed. There are still large patches of ice scattered around the property. I spent the majority of today picking up what limbs I could manage and throwing them in the burn pile. The larger ones I will have to wait until they thaw out a bit before I can take the saw out and chop them up and throw them in the burn pile as well. We had five days of no power. I honestly think that if it wasn’t for Kota and the kitties, snuggling with me on the couch. I don’t think I would’ve made it. There was one night. It was so cold in the house. I could hardly breathe.

It was quite eerie during the freezing rain. Pitch black outside the highway completely devoid of any traffic. No sounds at all, just dead silence. I wrapped a blanket around me and opened the sliding glass door. I was leaning on the wall just listening. I was waiting for the ominous sounds of limbs cracking and  dropping to the ground.

I could hear so clearly. I knew that some of them were coming from my trees. However, there were so many dropping. I knew they weren’t all my trees. I could hear them all around me. Curious, I went over to the front door and opened it and listened and I could hear them across the highway just dropping it was the most eerie of sounds. I heard at least three trees falling. One tree hit was such a thud. I knew that it hit something besides just the ground.

After the storm passed, and I could finally get out of my driveway. I went into town to do a little bit of grocery shopping. While I was there, I was thinking about all the guys who were working in horrendous conditions, trying to restore power to the people of Sweet Home and beyond. I wanted to do something so I picked up a thank you card. I went back to the truck and I filled it out and I was sitting there thinking, wondering how in the world I could get this card to majority of the dedicated workers?

I happen to glance up, and I noticed three of the trucks were parked behind the store. So I went over to the trucks, but I noticed that all of the occupants were sleeping. I wasn’t about to wake them up to give them a thank you note. Unfortunately, even though I’m 6 feet tall I couldn’t reach the windshield to leave it there. Those trucks are huge, I started to leave and another truck pulled up and I thought OK well I know he’s not asleep. I went over he got out of the truck and I handed him the card and just thanked him profusely for all they were doing and still doing to get everybody back to normal. I told him I don’t know how you can but please just make sure that as many of these dedicated people see this card so that they know how appreciated they are. He started laughing, and he said I had good timing. There were several ladies from town, not part of any organization. But they have been cooking for days and they were serving lunches for all of the guys that had worked and are still working.

I turned to go, and this lady walks up with her cell phone. She asked me what I was doing and I told her that I was just thinking these gentlemen for everything that they did. I thought she was just a normal citizen like me that wanted to come over and thank them. She asked me if she could take a picture of me with the guys (there were three of them by that time.) I told her I hadn’t had a shower in five days. I kind of joked and asked her if I could run home real quick and take a shower and then she could take the picture. Thank God I was wearing a wintet cap because it turns out she was a reporter for the local paper. She interviewed me for about 45 minutes. I’ll just say this it won’t be my best photo. Lol. But at least these guys know that they are appreciated not only because of my card but the food and the love in that booth were the women were waiting to give them an actual dinner besides a greasy hamburger and fries.

we are supposed to have snow later today, I will welcome snow a lot better than I welcome, freezing rain. I do know that more of my limbs are in danger of falling. They have been starved for water for six years because we’ve been in drought. Then we had torrential rains, which made them extremely heavy, and now on top of that, we had an ice storm and freezing rain and wind so there’s more ready to just take the plunge to earth. I believe that’s part of why my cats are hiding. I know that sound of those limbs breaking was freaking me out  with their acute sense of hearing, I can’t even imagine what they were thinking except to hide. hopefully, as it gets warmer, they will start coming out. But I will not stop putting food out just in case they happen to decide that it might be safe to finally come out and eat. It was so cold that my heating bowl for my water were not keeping the water warm enough and the water was iced over. It was bitter cold, and it was really scary to be alone in the dark with my animals listening to all of these limbs crashing down to earth. If I had been outside, I would be hiding as well.