Winter is here.

As you can see, winter has decended on north central Iowa with a vengence. Our first real snowfall of the year turned out to be a bona fide blizzard. Fortunately, while the wind gusted as much as fifty miles per hour, it wasn't all that cold. So I spend a half hour this morning trying to start my snowblower, which didn't want to run.

It is an inexpensive (i.e. cheap) Simplicity single stage blower, and pretty anemic even by single stage standards. After many tries and several removals and cleanings of the spark plug, I finally got the thing started, after which it ran fine. Once that was taken care of the driveway and sidewalk went quickly enough.

As I write this, the snow has all but stopped falling. The wind is still blowing fiercely however, and travel isn't recommended. In town is fine, but there are white-outs in the country, or so I'm told. All in all, a good day to stay indoors.