Ice Foggy with a Chance of Fireworks

It is a wonderful peaceful New Year's Eve here in Fairbanks, Alaska, about 160 miles south of the Arctic Circle. The current temp on my iPhone is -43 degrees Fahrenheit. -42 Celsius. The weather is, what I might call, Nature's way of keeping drunks off the road.
The slab on our garage floor has a frozen spot which means that the circulating liquid in the usually warm floor is not moving. Yes, there is the danger of breakage. What can we do? Warm it is our only possibility. We were out in the 40 degree garage last night working on it. Paul reinstalled the Toyostove, by hooking up the fuel line to the existing feed to our boiler. (Tools needed: wrenches, rags, small containers for drips, flaring tool, pipe cutter, extension cord, bandaids). This happened once before, so there was already a hole cut in the garage wall for the exhaust. I was the Go-fer and manned the propane torch on suspect areas of the floor. We also had to move everything away from the walls and up off the slab to encourage warm air flow.

The pictures on this page were taken at 11:00 am in our drive to get a kerosene area burner.
Ice fog is the sad product of a beautiful, clear, cold day in Fairbanks trapping our foul stench into a bowl of pollution within the ring of hills. In this no wind zone, the cold, dirty, heavy air hangs around us like an obnoxious drunk at a New Year's Eve party.

The temperature in the garage is now about 90 degrees, encouraging the slab to give up its ice. The results should be soon.

Keeping a car running at these temperatures is a challenge. Like Tina Fey as Sarah Palin once said to "Hilary" (Amy Poehler), "You gotta want it!" Outside cars (sadly both of ours right now) need to be plugged in to start. Environmentally, you should plug in at any temperature colder than 20 degrees. The plug in powers the engine block heater (head bolt) and/or a battery blanket. If you have a diesel engine or an air cooled car, plan on staying home for a few days if you don't have a garage. Newcomers should know to ask an employer if there are plug-ins available. Otherwise, if it drops below -10 or so, you'll have to go out and start your car every 2-3 hours. Auto starts were definitely designed for up here.

In the 70s, when I first moved here, the temperatures in the winter were consistently colder and the cold stretches lasted longer. And that is not just my faulty memory- it's on record.

In those days, when people kept their cars running all the time, someone I knew (ahem- you know who you are) carried a bag of potatoes to put into exhaust pipes, causing a stall. Hey, people would just abandon their cars any old place and "run in", blocking roadways, parking lots, etc. It was also necessary to use "frost shields", plastic pockets to attach strategically to windows so that frost wouldn't build up ON THE INSIDE of the car preventing you from seeing out. Better heaters and defrosters have eliminated that need. I also remember draining our jello-like oil from the car into a pan to heat on the stove before replacing. Extension cords are like uncooked spaghetti and liquid anti-freeze is the coldest substance known to man when temps drop.

I had a momentary flash of insight last night when I realized how unprepared we are for a power outage. Almost everything for our comfort and survival relies on electricity now. In the 70s, everyone had a backup generator, woodstove and propane campstove. We only have 2 out of 3. We also used to have a garbage can full of water for when our water went out (when we had running water). Thankfully, we now have a cell phone and a non-plug in phone in the garage.

Tonight there are supposed to be fireworks at 8:00 pm. It's a big deal here because on the 4th of July, there is too much daylight preventing visible fireworks. Our tradition is to walk up to the University with lawn chairs and hot chocolate to watch. One year, it was really cold (about -25) and we walked up and waited, but all the fireworks went off in one huge blast. It only took about 90 seconds due to pyrotechnic misfire. Oops. They will be cancelled tonight if the ice fog is too thick.

We were also going to go to a movie, but we rented "Hancock" instead. When the kids lived at home, we played games all night- everyone picking one. I hate Monopoly and eventually the kids could beat me at Scrabble, but we had fun anyway.

Have a great New Year!