Snowmageddon and the Christmas snowblower

I hope you had a good Christmas, despite the weather. The blizzard was kind of like the old Rankin/Bass stop motion animation classic, "Rudolph the Red-nosed Reindeer." It was weather like last week that gave Rudolph a job, so let it never be said that bad weather is all bad.

We left town on Tuesday night to ensure that we would be able to make it to our daughter's home in Minneapolis. They graciously accommodated us for not one, but two extra nights, due to the Christmas Blizzard of '09, which I imagine the storm will be referred to in the years to come. I'm sure many of you either had extra houseguests or delayed Christmas festivities for a week. There's not much that can be done when over a foot and a half of snow falls and the wind blows.

So we arrived safely in Brooklyn Center at my daughter and son-in-law's home on Tuesday night. After getting up on Wednesday, we began blizzard preparations. My wife and daughter headed to the grocery store to lay in provisions for an extended period of time. In a scene played out all over the upper Midwest, gallons of milk, loaves of bread and canned goods of all sorts were snatched up by harried shoppers preparing for the "Snowmageddon" as one Minneapolis radio person referred to the storm.

I have found that it is during these times of panic (as well as at all-you-can-eat buffets) that the true nature of people is revealed. Is it worth wrestling a grandmother for the last can of pork and beans? Really?

I think not.

So, as the women folk were getting the food, son-in-law Thomas and I were on a very different mission. When they purchased their home earlier this year, the next door neighbors had given them a used snowblower. "All it needs is a belt" was what Thomas was told, so we ventured forth to secure a new belt.

Of course we needed a gas can, oil to mix with the fuel and an extension cord for the electric start. And another shovel -- just in case. Confident that we would soon have the snowblower running, we departed the store.

Pride goes before a fall, so the expression says...

After installing the belt and adding the fuel, we were ready to fire up the machine which would save us from the storm. Fuel added, check. Choke on, check. Primer pushed the required number of times, check. Cord plugged in to electric starter, check. Time for the moment of truth.

You guessed it, nothing.

I began to hear my late father's mechanic trouble shooting voice in my head. "Have you got gas?" I could hear the Chief say. "Yes," I answered in my mind. "Do you have spark?" the second question on the list came up next. I suggested we pull the sparkplug.

Finding the plug proved maddeningly difficult. Thomas ended up removing about a dozen screws to take the cover off of the snowblower. When the cover was removed, he discovered the rubber cover on the panel that covered the spark plug.

Undaunted, we headed back to the store to buy a spark plug. We knew we were close, so close. The weather radio robotic voice said that the storm would be similar to the Halloween Blizzard of 1991, so we would need the machine to save us from the snow.

The new sparkplug installed, we went through the process. Choke on, check. Primer pushed the required number of times, check. Cord plugged in to electric starter, check. Surely it would work THIS time.

Nothing doing.

After trying combinations of pull starting, changing the gap of the sparkplug, swearing and laughing at the situation, we finally through in the towel.

So I helped scoop snow several times. When Thomas' father and three of his brothers came over on Saturday, the process was repeated with the same result.

It was much funnier watching others struggle from the warmth of the house.

It wasn't nearly as funny removing the glacier from my driveway after returning home, even with a functioning snowblower and the kind assistance of neighbor Jeff Miksch. Jeff, you da man.

As always, I welcome your comments. You can reach me by email at tstangl@lemarscomm.net, telephone 712-546-7031, x40 or toll free 1-800-728-0066 x40.

Thanks for reading, I'll keep in touch. Feel free to do the same.