Strange weather yesterday...

Strange weather yesterday...  First it was wind – 60 MPH gusts, and steady winds of 40 MPH or more for several hours.  Our pines were bent into odd shapes, and lost a few small branches; our choke-cherries were bent over nearly sideways to the ground.  The flags were snapping like crazy, and of course standing straight out – even the small and heavy Gadsden flag.  I was surprised (and happy!) to see that the top of the flagpole didn't move around much.

Then later in the afternoon we got a few sprinkles, and then it started snowing.  In the high winds the snow swirled all around in the vortexes around the house, even though it was wet and heavy snow.  We got about two inches all together.  The driveway is well above freezing, so nothing stuck to that.  The trees and grass are all covered, though.  This is exactly what the local farmers were hoping for, to get a nice soak into the just-planted fields.  The 12 acre field south of our house is planted with alfalfa, after a nice dose of cow manure and careful mechanical preparation this year.  The 2.5 acre field northwest of our house has been mechanically prepared, and will be planted with a grass/alfalfa mix next week.

Around 6 pm we lost power, and it wasn't restored for almost three hours.  There was a downed power line a mile or so from our house that took out power to 391 homes, naturally including ours.  This reinforces our goal of getting a backup generator in place.  We'll probably do that later this spring...