Snow Blown

We had a hell of a day today. We got another 4" of snow overnight, not too bad. We started by manually shoveling our walk. The walk in front of the house and the first 20 feet of the driveway went quickly, not too bad for a couple of overweight middle aged people. Rowan seems to have strained her back a little but an ice pack did wonders. 

This afternoon after the soreness set in, I thought the smart thing to do would be to get fresh gas and see if I could get the snowblower running. It was serviced 2 years ago so things were more or less ready to go since it hasn't been run since the servicing. It hasn't been used to clear snow since 2007 when it lived in Erie with Rowan. It was reluctant to turn over but it started to chug along nicely when I noticed the pull start didn't retract. Yep. Busted. Then it stalled and I tried to start it again with the foot of cord that would retract. It worked! I rolled it outside and the engine became steadier. I texted Rowan to come out and give me instruction (I'm a snow blow virgin) and she showed me how it should work. That's when we discovered it was stuck in reverse. Nothing we could do would make it go forward. So now we need service for 2 completely unexpected issues but the damn thing runs beautifully and starts with 1/8 of a pull!

Once all the snowblower adventures were complete we moved on to studio concerns. We had a bisc kiln to unload and had brought biscware to finish, which meant emptying boxes and setting up shelves and tables. And the slab roller :) because it was looking so sad and neglected.

Tomorrow we'll get the pots waxed and glazed and firing. I plan on throwing more pieces and then on Thursday our first clay delivery will arrive!