On the positive side, he's been doing weight-lifting exercises routinely for the past two years. On the negative side, he's had to cope with working around the fact that two months ago he suffered an accident, seriously slicing two important digits of his left hand; index finger and thumb. They required extensive stitching, and have been gradually on the mend. Despite which he has not avoided any of his usual activities, ranging from driving long distances, to working on new stained glass windows. The two fingers are still bandaged, and he does that himself as well, refreshing the dressings every two days.

The incessant pain is now an ache and may or may not disappear in time. None of which stops him from doing much, other than he had put off changing the tires in the car from all-weather to ice tires. Yesterday's snowstorm warning gave him little option but to attack the job. And that's what he did, hauling the ice tires up from the basement where he stores them over the summer months, changing the tires on the car, then hauling downstairs to the basement the all-weather tires.

The snow did come down overnight, greeting us this morning with more snow falling. Looking out the bedroom windows last night, in the middle of the night, the stained glass windows glowed with the reflected light of the snow crystals falling, a warm glow of transcendentally ephemeral light, exceedingly beautiful and comforting.

He had not been able to start up the snow-thrower when he tried yesterday earlier in the day. He had filled up a gasoline container when we were out and about, then filled the snow-thrower, still no action. This morning, he cleaned the spark plugs, but they weren't dirty. The gas just wasn't getting up through the gas lines, so he remedied that through sustained manual suction, and was able to clear out the driveway. In the early morning hours he had been up shovelling the deck and the walkways below free of snow, for our little dog's use.

All in a day's work for a homeowner in this frozen northern country.