Quote of the Moment

"It's never wrong to hope, Byx," said my mother. "Unless the truth says otherwise."
- from Endling #1: The Last, by Katherine Applegate

Monday, December 22, 2008

Snowy Pictures


Well, if you've missed the news for the past week or so, there's been a bit of snow out here in the Pacific Northwest. How much snow? We got roughly 7 1/2 inches total at our house, though within driving distance they had over a foot. It's made for terrible traffic, but pretty pictures, some of which I'll now impose on you.

The Porch under Fresh Snow
That would be the same hummer feeder that features in the previous blog entry's pictures (the last two, at least.) Notice the difference.
Incidentally, we do still have a few hummers zipping around. They're hardier than you might imagine.

Pickering Lake with Snow
Many, many years ago, within my own dim memory, this was a small airport. Then the developers moved in and built a bunch of retail shops; for covering up major aquafier filtering grounds, they had to create artificial wetlands, the center of which is Pickering Lake, named for the family that owned the land when it was a farm, before the airport. The circle of life continues...

A Light by the Lake
Believe it or not, there's normally a walking path near this light.

Icicles on the Light by the Lake
The temperature's starting to nose above freezing, so we're getting some beautiful icicles. Normally, we don't get too many icicles in snowstorms, but normally we don't get over 7 inches of snow at any given time.

Tree under Snow
Lakeside boughs bow beneath the weight of the weather.

Water Feature near Lake
When they put in the artificial lake, they went all-out, including bridges and a walking loop and this nifty little fountain.

The Bridge In Snow
A self-explanatory pair of pictures...

Never Too Cold for a Swim...
The local waterfowl make a point of stopping by in even the coldest weather, as the lake's fountain (not picture) and related intake/circulation vents create holes in the ice. Here, a merganser and some unidentified ducks enjoy the oasis.

... But It Can Be Too Cold for Coffee
The local bookstore has a cafe in the back which overlooks the lake. It hadn't seen much use today, for some reason.

Fortunately for you, that's all I managed. As of now, it looks like the snow is going to be thawing in fits and starts through the end of the week, and hopefully beyond. We're still not holding our breath on things not slopping up again with refreezing or rain or snow, so we still don't know exactly what we're doing for Xmas. But at least we nearly had a white Xmas, and today at least I got to visit a little winter wonderland.

1 comment:

PeppyPilotGirl said...

Geesh - it looks like our area!

chorym... the male version of a chorine!