Monday morning maniacal weather et. al.

Yup, this is what we're watching outside the window this morning. Actually, I was standing on the ladder wiping off the satellite dish when I snapped this photo.

It continues now, snowing for more than half an hour, wind blowing, snow whirling around in suspended animation, flower beds turning white against a deep green lawn.

April showers bring May flowers, they used to say.

But they used to mean rain.

Yup, our climate continues to change---on an hourly basis.

Yesterday offered several entrees but no snow. It was cold. It was sorta warm for a while. It was dry. It was wet. It was pleasant. The sun shone. The clouds rolled in, some dark purple, loaded with water.

Climate change is an ever-changing phenomenon.

Some people say it's that volcano up there in Alaska. As it continues to erupt, our weather patterns continue to spew out all kinds of surprises.

I do remember weird weather with the Mt. St. Helens major eruptions in May 1980. Hard to believe that's been nearly 30 years.

It took a while for the weather to figure itself out that year too. So, if the volcano is the culprit, I guess we have to be patient.

Meanwhile, I had planned to go to a horse geocaching event at Farragut yesterday. Yes, you can go geocaching via horseback, and a bunch of 4-H'ers were going to learn how to use GPS to go find caches on their horses.

Too many variables got in the way, so I didn't go, but Bill and I sneaked off in late afternoon and did some geocaching of our own. Along our way we met an 83-year-old Minnesotan who had trained at Farragut Naval Training Station in 1942.

He later went to the South Pacific, and vowed that he'd never come back to Idaho again after his experience of riding the train to Farragut and going through boot camp.

Turns out he went back on his word and returned in 1959 to farm and log. Now he plots out subdivisions and hopes to sell a few lots. He came along while we were looking for a micro-cache and thought he had some hot customers.

Instead, he had a couple of folks more interested in hearing his Farragut stories and finding the micro-cache. Both wishes were satisfied.

We also ended up at the grange hall pictured below. I don't know what it is about grange halls, but I love 'em. The older and more paint-chipped the better.

Anyway, weather continues to play a role in our daily lives but we didn't let it stop us from having a pleasant afternoon.