it was still cold this morning, so i busted out the puffy jacket for the first time this season. i don't usually wear it because it looks ridiculous but it's the warmest thing i have. midway i had to unzip because it was getting too hot. the ride was uneventful until i got to belmont. maybe the town squandered its street cleaning budget but the roads were barely plowed. the snow on the streets were reduced to a powdery grey slush that was very difficult to ride on.
i was dismayed to discover that nobody had taken care of the shrubs and the trees, and how some of them were crushed by the weight of the snow. i went out with a broom handle to free the plants (quince, lilacs, bamboos, arborvitae). my sister helped out as well, while hailey - dressed in her winter garb - hovered around, waiting for us to throw snow at her so she can catch it.
afterwards she wouldn't come back inside, but would wait at the bottom of the staircase. either she wanted to continue playing in the snow - or she was probably waiting for us to bribe her with a dog treat. she finally did come inside but was restless until we realized she needed to go to the bathroom (i guess the excitement of the snow made her forget to do her business).
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when my father came home we moved the broken tree trunk of the backyard pine tree that had snapped in half during the blizzard. we were lucky that it didn't crash into the fence, or fall into the neighbor's yard, or even damage the house. i don't really know what kind of tree it is, maybe a lawson cypress. the old lady who lived next door apparently knew, and even asked for some branches many years ago when she was making a floral display (she's since passed away i think). it was a fairly tall tree, but my father said it already had a crack in the trunk which contributed to the snapping.
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the ravens-steelers game at 4:30 had implications for the patriots, since the winners would face new england should the patriots win their game tomorrow. i was rooting for the steelers, since the ravens could potentially be a legitimate threat for new england. it didn't look good though, since baltimore had a 21-7 lead going into the second half. but pittsburgh managed to tie in the game in the 3rd quarter to eventually win (although it was close).
i had some beef tendon noodle soup for dinner. after the first game was over (close to 8:00), i rushed back to cambridge to catch the second game. instead of pushing my bike all the way into the backyard, i parked it outside, perched on top of a 4 feet high snow mound beneath a street sign.
game 2 was between the packers and the falcons. this was the atlanta team that was just a game shy of tying with the patriots for the best regular season record. i was rooting for green bay because the patriots beat them in the regular season (atlanta was an unknown since new england didn't play them this year). the game started with a lot of back and forth: the falcons would score a touchdown, the packers would come right back and sore one of their own, falcons again, then packers again. but then green bay just opened it up to close out the first half with 2 more touchdowns off of atlanta turnovers. with the score at 28-14 going into the second half, the packers just clamped down, scoring 2 more touchdowns for a 42-14 lead. the falcons showed that contrary to their regular season record, they weren't really that great a team.
i brought home my electricity usage meter to measure how much power my new jumbo LED clock was using. if it was a power suck that would've been a deal breaker. i was surprised to see that it actually drew ZERO electricity. this is one these weird electricity quirks and the difference between wattage versus apparent power. although i wasn't getting a watt reading, technically it was still using power, but as apparent power. long story short, this thing uses very little electricity. later when i checked the meter again, it read 1 watt.