BESIDE THE POINT

My love/hate deal with winter weather

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I have no idea what the weather looks like this morning. I’m either moaning about having to get the leaf blower out to blow snow off the sidewalks, or groaning about having to get the shovel out.
I just can’t see the investment in a snow blower with having less than 100 feet of actual sidewalk at my house. So I just continue with the rudimentary methods of heaving it with a shovel or turning on the air machine before anyone walks on it.
One of my biggest pet peeves is white shoe prints on freshly cleared sidewalks. It’s very…forensic.
I’ve been trying to figure out the most back-saving, cost-effective, time-saving way to remove snow from my walks for more than the quarter of a century we’ve lived in Fort Madison.
I even thought about having a warm water system installed under the sidewalk. When we lived in Columbus, Neb. there was a restaurant called The Gottberg Brewpub, that did this very thing. During the winter the sidewalks were damp at worst. It was a thing of wonder, but with one drawback. It attracted every bird in the city and we all know what happens when birds congregate. Restaurant staff was routinely spraying the sidewalk off. So instead of spending time on salt and shoveling, they spent water on spraying.
I’ve done things like taking out squeegees as the snow starts and quickly scraping the sidewalks without having to do much lifting of snow. That’s the key as you get older. It’s not the cold that does the damage, it's the heavy lifting, especially when the snow is wet.
Earlier this year, I used the leaf blower with less than an inch. I’ve seen many do it downtown to keep walks clean. The downside is that I have two sides to the house so, at some point, the snow is blowing back onto the sidewalk and it takes way more time to clean them than you would think.
One time when a heavy storm hit the area, Chris Faulkner tried to shovel my walks for me after I put out a request. He ended up in the hospital after I told him not to. But that’s Chris…for the fellow man. I think we’re all blessed that he did because it found an underlying issue. But no more shoveling, Chris. I don’t care if it’s six feet and you just see my hand waving from under a pile. On that same night, another friend got in his truck with a blade and pushed the walk and the yard in most places. But I was in the hospital with my mother who was dying and couldn’t get back to the area.
Friends.
Anyway, snow bugs the crap out of me after Christmas unless I don’t have anything else to do on a day and can just watch it fall out my windows. But then… the shoveling thing.
This year my brother bought his wife an “igloo” of sorts that sits on their backyard patio. This is a geometric wonder. I know because I helped build that damn thing. The instructions were basically a lesson in polygonical geometric systems, and three guys that like to think they're just as smart as the people who designed the thing. If you’ve seen Iron Man 3, you saw the fictional Tony Stark invent a new element, well I’m not fictional to most and I’m pretty sure John, Hayden, and I built a new element with historic coaching from the sidelines from sister-in-law Susan and her brother Steve.
But this thing now has a heater and a small movie theater in it and they can sit out there on a cold snowy night and watch it snow on them while they take in a football game. The kegerator and nacho cheese machine are just inside the house for snacks. The bigger fear here is that the neo-fort has just one flap for a window and a zip up flap. I’m pretty sure it’s the biggest viral incubator known to man. I spent about three hours in there on New Year’s Eve and, knock on wood, have come out unscathed. But everyone in there has been sick at least once since that night.
In our quest to enjoy the immense beauty of a Midwest snowstorm, we always try to find ways to stay safe while having fun experiencing it.
Taylor even suggested we look at solar panel roads. I think they tried something similar in Norway or some other European country with too much money. The panels were permeable so water would drain through and into a system that collected the precipitation, be it rain or melting snow, and rush it away from the roads into the ecosystem.
I started thinking. Remember those bumper car days where they had the “shoe” that rubbed along the metal grating that made up the ceiling. They would spark occasionally as that’s where the electrical conduction came from. Well, if we reversed that and put the shoe under an electrical vehicle, as the solar panels generated energy, someone who hasn’t already created an element, could create a coating on them that would generate electricity from a shoe placed on the “bottom” of the car that drags along the panels gently creating friction and thus energy. This way the vehicle could create energy that could be transferred similar to the way a home transfers energy from solar panels into a battery cell inside the vehicle. Then when a gauge says the cars at 400% power and is about to blow up, you can pull up to the kiosk and SELL the energy where you now BUY energy.
Now there are many of you saying, “Oh man, Chuck’s writing this thing at 3 a.m. sitting at the black barrel with his buddy Jameson." IYKYK. (that’s the first and last time I’ll ever use that chicken acronym-wanna be).
Nope, I’m sitting at home in front of my fake fireplace cabinet warming the house, Frankie and Jonnie chirping over my shoulder, and a cold glass of diluted aronia berry and pomegranate juice – just waiting for all this damned snow. Happy New Year everyone.– But that’s Beside the Point.
Chuck Vandenberg is editor and co-owner of the Pen City Current and can be reached at Charles.V@PenCityCurrent.com.

Sunday, editorial, opinion, snow, shoveling, elements, igloo, family, winter, Pen City Current, Chuck Vandenberg, Beside the Point,

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