Boy! It’s Cold! - January 21, 2025 @goldenoakfarm

On Tuesday morning the thermometer read -12F. The masonry heater was radiating at 168F but the living room was only 68F. You know it’s cold out when that happens!

It was supposed to be sunny, but it was mostly weak sun through clouds, so I kept the wood stove going all day. I didn’t put more wood in the masonry heater because, you know, sun was supposed to shine and I had to work in the living room.

I got my post up, got a shower, finished the laundry, and cleaned up the kitchen. Then I went in and started packing away the bubble lights. I expected to find more dead ones, as I go through 12+ bulbs a year usually and I had replaced none on the tree. But there were only 5 or 6 for the 14 strings.

I went out early to get photos of the driveway because my brother said it would be pretty in the sun. But there wasn’t enough sun to really make it pop.

I took photos of the house and barn in the snow while I was at it.

Our stoves are pretty efficient and you don’t often see smoke but I had just put wood in before coming out and not shut the wood stove down. So here’s a rare smoke shot.

I called the dentist at 8AM and a miracle occurred. I got an appointment for 2PM. I just had to find a ride over there. But every friend and the Senior van I called had something going on at 2PM also! So finally I called Tom and he managed to make time to take me.

My helper friend arrived at 9:30AM and carried up all the boxes to the spare room. Next he started bringing in more wood for both wood boxes.

He brought down the box for the stocking holder from the attic and I packed it up. Then we brought up the wreathes, repaired lights, and holder and put them away.

I’d moved all the boxes for the bubble lights over to go upstairs and he took them up. I got started taking the lights off the trees. As I finished a section I tied it up to make taking the lights off the next lower one easier.

The first 5 strings I took off would not work properly. They had been fine on the tree! I labeled them with the problems they had and set them aside. They’d go to the attic as spares. The 6th string worked fine and I replaced the burnt out bulbs before carefully packing it away. The bag on the left side of the couch has a string that doesn’t work and I use the bulbs to replace dead ones in working strings.

The 2 cardboard boxes on the coffee table are the new replacements for the strings that wouldn’t work.

This is all the mess left in the living room, just lights boxes and bags for the tree sections. Oh, and the green tote is for the linens, which are half done.

I worked until 12:30PM and carefully ate some lunch and got ready to go to the dentist. They had a heck of a time finding the broken part, as it precisely fit and hadn’t fallen out. I finally had to wiggle it for them as it wasn’t showing on the Xrays.

The dentist wasn’t in the office on Tuesdays so they sent the Xrays to him to review when he could and sent me home with a referral to a dental surgeon. I was to make an appointment ASAP with the surgeon because he was booking way out. If I didn’t need the appointment, I could cancel.

So I wait to hear from my dentist on whether he can do the work. The problem is the root goes into the sinus area. I was home by 3:30PM and pretty tired so I just sat and rested between times to feed the stove.

I made supper at 5PM and at 5:10PM, the tooth broke and the piece fell out. I’d been told to call when that happened and they’d get me in for a temporary thing to be put in until the work could be done.

So I called but the office had closed and so I have to call on Wednesday morning. So I make 2 calls to dentists before I have to go to exercise class. The good part is it doesn’t (knock wood) hurt now. But who knows how long that will last…

When I get back from exercise class, I’ll resume on the Christmas tree. It sure looks odd half done. That ought to take me the rest of the day. It’s to be bitter cold, worse than Tuesday but supposed to be sunny.

I got the stoves cranking at 4PM and we’ll stay on top of them during the night as it’s supposed to go to-9F, probably colder here.