Long Winter?
It seems to have been a long winter. Do the winters get longer every year strictly because of psychology? Last year this time we were just about out of firewood. This year we still have a lot left over, but only because we got more to start with in the summer and fall. Overall we have had more snow blower runs that last year, longer spells of cold temperatures I think.
The plants have started to be started in the house. Seems early but is actually later compared to last year.
There is still a hole in the greenhouse roof, and its covered in snow.
The supplier of the polycarbonate roofing material has been out of stock for two months now… we will stop in again today to see if they have restocked.
If not it will have to be a patch job of some other leftover green opaque poly, screws and silicon. The greenhouse needs to be functional again.
We took down the broken eavestrough as well… the wood behind it, supporting it, was rotten from too much water exposure. That will have to be fixed as well before the plants go into the ground in late May.
The cats went out on the back deck for a short time.. the first time in months. It was still cold and snow covered and they went back in fairly quickly.
The BBQ got a new large size H burner installed yesterday as well. It seems only last year that a new one went in (March 2011 actually! Then 2009 April before that). They certainly do not last long. The BBQ we got from Loblaws some years ago (2008?).
Spring equinox is coming up on Wednesday March 20th, 2013.. always a good reason to have a BBQ!
Another tirade against the upcoming daylight savings time coming up on Sunday March 10th, 2013. Daylight Savings Time Does Not Work. There is no net benefit.
There is net harm. Both to humans, traffic collisions and workplace incidents, and to home and work technology. Hours and hours of troubleshooting, repair for what we are told is a method to save electricity. Guess what. That explanation/excuse is totally ignorant of modern day electricity use. It was conceived at a time when the biggest power use was electric light. That is not even close to being true today. We have also switched over to a time of use power use metering system. Again we can manage our own use on an hour by hour basis and do not need an artificial external change to modify our behaviour this way. Guess what… time of use works! We have moved and adapted as much as we can because now we have the information to do so.
EndDaylightSavings is a place to start looking. Too bad it is aimed at the US.. but then again if they drop it, Canada will follow like a poor small sad puppy. (veiled reference to the failed and very bad ACTA). In a nutshell:
“A full examination of Bill C-56 is forthcoming, but its introduction raises four immediate issues: that Canada is moving toward ACTA ratification, that it is pursuing policy based on debunked data on counterfeiting, that the bill could have serious harmful effects with border guards forced to serve as copyright experts without court oversight, and the increased criminalization of copyright and trademark law.”