The week has been eventful.
Our national media community has been rocked by revelations of violent behaviour towards women, by one of Canada’s prominent talk show hosts, Jian Ghomeshi. Plenty of news about him everywhere in the Canadian media, so I do not want to discuss him here. Also, the Ebola virus continues to spread, and people in Africa continue to die, there is no way to tell if this issue will impact all humans on the planet, or if it will be contained, another issue well covered by the media, so that I do not want to discuss it here. I mention these two events only to mark them in my personal journal, this journal, as an acknowledgement of the larger context in which I live.
Closer to home, the real estate listing for our country house expired yesterday. The realtor called to inquire if we wanted to extend the listing, we did not. She came by later in the day to remove the signs and we had a brief and friendly chat. She said it was the quietest year for home sales she has ever experienced. She is retirement age, and has been selling real estate in this area for more than three decades. That puts our experiences, or lack of of it, into perspective.
We decided to let the listing expire for the winter at least. Heating with wood is hard work, and messy. Most of our lower floor windows and some of our main floor windows will be boarded up for the winter, so that we can afford to heat the place. Both of these things do not make for an appealing home for sale. Someone with a higher income would enjoy this house, using the electric heating system, the masonry heater for pleasure firings, and not having to worry about the extra heat loss from the beautiful windows.
Yesterday was cold and wet and blustery. I fear the weather was very unpleasant for little trick or treaters as they made their visits. There were no trick or treaters within miles of us, and I only remembered it was Hallowe’en because Terra sent me a picture of herself, in costume for her workplace.
This morning is much the same, cold and blustery, with one addition, our first snow. It fell during the night, leaving a light dusting on the ground and above, where it was underlined as far as the eye could see by tree branches.
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I spent the yesterday morning helping out at a local business for a few hours. It is quite a change in activity level, going from being sequestered in the living area of our house for weeks, then working at mild physical activity. I was exhausted! So much so that I went to bed early, and slept in until almost 6:00 a.m., well past the the time when I usually awaken.
As for our plans for today when Attila gets home from work, domestic tasks are at the forefront. Attila will board up the windows for the winter. We have thawed a turkey and will have a turkey dinner with dressing and all the trimmings for dinner.
Worldly Distractions
Weather
-1°C
Date: 10:00 AM EDT Saturday 1 November 2014
Condition: Mostly Cloudy
Pressure: 102.5 kPa
Visibility: 16 km
Temperature: -0.9°C
Dewpoint: -2.9°C
Humidity: 86%
Wind: NNW 17 gust 28 km/h
Wind Chill: -6
Quote
“The world is round; it has no point.”
Adrienne E. Gusoff
Love that pic of your woods with its first covering of snow! Beautiful!
We also had snow here, several hours after all the trick or treaters had gone home. My pic isn’t as nice as yours, though. The snow only stuck on the roofs, bushes, and the cars. It melted on contact with the ground.
Thanks Teri! So it snowed to the south too, melting fast here now, as the morning progresses.
It snowed way way south of you… in Tennessee, USA. It melted fast, but the temperature is going to plummet tonight. I’m not ready for this! MWHAAAAAA.
I swear, it seems just yesterday I was reading about your life during the winter and the firings… and the discipline you have to make it all work efficiently. You continue to amaze me!
Wow, snow in Tennessee too, yikes! Sends a shiver up my spine.
Most, but not all, of our snow was gone by nightfall. Tonight the prediction is clear skies, and tomorrow sunshine. Fingers crossed.
Yes, winter is upon us once again. The heater is fully charged now and keeping us warm. We are hoping for a mild winter, but the prediction is that it will be another long and cold one, which is great if your drinking beer, and unwelcome when your talking weather. So far so good, Mist hasn’t complained of the cold once this week, so we are doing something right. We have the feline stamp of approval.
Nice photo, very still. No snow here just windy cold and rainy. I think one of our coldest days so far though.
Is there a simple trick for getting a picture of yourself next to your name instead of having a design?
Nora, tonight is our coldest night for the next week or so, if the weather people are correct. We had two firings today so that we will wake up to a warm house.
I think the pictures come from a google plus account, or it could be a wordpress account, not sure,they autofill on me everywhere I go, and I can’t really remember where or when I ok’d that, but I think it was a google plus thing.
Anyone else remember how that works?
Thanks for asking about the pics, Nora. I’d wondered that too but just figured that Maggie was adding them in.
I’m on Google Plus, but I don’t think I have a picture on there… (I’m not really active-active on G+.)
How interesting! I just came here to check on other comments and saw that my photo has changed. My granddaughter asked me to sign up an account with Instagram and I used that photo which I guess filtered down by default? Beats me.
This fits right in with the *photo* conversation. 🙂
I am already ‘Googled’ with a photo so I am just stumped as to why it does not surface. Oh, well…..if I tool around a little I may find the answer.
Thanks for asking Maggie and thanks you to those who responded too!
Nora, I just looked at the link to my image, and it leads back to gravatar.com, where you can create a “universal” avatar (image) and online profile for yourself. There is a create your own gravatar button on the page, which will take you to sign up screen.
Let’s see if I did this right. Apparently I was already signed up from something I must have done but did not have an image. I can not keep track of myself! If an image does appear thank you Maggie!
Drats.
Okay, sorry I can’t delete some of these posts! I went back in and they say it takes some time for the avatar to show so maybe next time I post it will. It is clearly there on the homepage. Fingers crossed.
Nora, I like that you are outlining the process as you go along, the information could be useful to someone else! Thanks!
I am going to try again because enough time has passed…..if it doesn’t show I will go back in.
Okay, I had to go back in and the problem I was having was that I had not rated my avatar to ‘G’. I was rated for PG, R and X. Most sites will only accept ‘G’. So, when one is finished uploading their photo they have to choose one rating. “G” is the first. x0x0x0
Great Nora! Now we know, thanks for doing the research and sharing it!
My pleasure Maggie.
There is also WordPress, and signing up to be able to receive notifications from some peoples’ journals and to be able to comment, I got an avatar with that. I was surprised to see my Egyptian “Neb Was Djed Ankh” show up here, too. But then you use Word Press program on your own domain, so I think that is why. I don’t remember giving it a rating.
I see what you mean Joan, just checked out your avatar elsewhere, it is different! When I visited gravatar.com recently, they mentioned WordPress on their site, but I don’t think you had to sign up for a WordPress account to get a gravatar, just fill in the form at gravatar.com.