“Remoted” Workday 218 / Day 330 (Tuesday)

Oh, good, it snowed some more. All day long. The hand crafted snow mountain in the front yard is growing, and my skill at flinging the snow over the four foot tall fence is becoming quite exceptional. 

Hand flung snow mountain.

Last night, as I was about to let the dogs out, I saw that the gutter over the front door had dripped and turned the concrete stairs into an ice encrusted sculpture that could break a neck. Salt was applied, and this morning I was able to chisel off the ice. Of course, it hasn’t been checked for several hours, so who knows what it looks like now.

After work it was a quick supper before a board meeting followed by an event meeting, and there was no 5:00 shovel session. During the brief lunchtime shovel break, the stairs to the side deck and the area of the deck outside the door were finally cleared of the snow from last Monday. The deck stairs don’t collect ice like the front stone and concrete stairs do, and if they hadn’t been buried in a big drift with the big storm last week, they would have been cleared right away.

It felt good. The thing I like about manual labor is the visible results. With the bread and butter work-work, the results are seen mostly as items crossed of a list. Of course, the financial measurement in the form of the regular paycheck is also pretty sweet. 

With shoveling, I put my head down and get busy, and a few minutes later when I step back and survey the landscape, the level of progress is almost always a surprise. It may not be paid work, but it’s still satisfying. It turns out a lot of shoveling can be done in around 20 minutes, at least when it’s the lighter stuff. Now, with the deck stairs cleared, there is an alternate entry to the house for the EMTs after I collapse from all the shoveling. Next up, teaching the dogs to call 911.