Final Throes

We called it Puff.  It served us well, pressing hundreds of yards of textiles in the time we had it.  We are still hoping to find a new home for it, but things have gotten complicated.  As in...the weather.

Suddenly it's winter and it's wintering hard.  First we (the entire province almost) got slammed with one long winter snow storm.  Roads were closed.  Avalanche mitigation was done, closing more roads.  We now have a respectable amount of snow cover which allays some fears of not having enough snow pack in the mountains to get us through the summer.

And now it's getting cold.  As in harsh cold.  At this moment it is minus 20C.  The forecast is predicting temps down even further as the week progresses as in the minus 30C range.  (F and C converge at -40)

And today Doug and his helper go pull wire.

When Puff was installed, there was no heavy duty electrical panel and the boiler needed one to run.  So we bought one and hired an electrician to hook it up.  However, it meant running a heavy duty wire from the big box up into our room.  Since we bought and paid for that, and the landlord has assured us he doesn't want it, Doug is removing it and will try to find a local buyer.

But some of the places the wire runs is in unheated areas.  So the guys are dressing warmly and will take breaks to prevent frost bite.  Working in heavy gloves/mitts will be a challenge and so the whole job may take all day as they may need to go warm up.  Repeatedly.

In the meantime I continue to work on weaving.  I pressed a run of place mats on the little press and need to contact the person who wants them that they are now ready.  I finished weaving the burgundy mats and need to wet finish them.

But I also finished dressing the Megado with the silk warp, filled bobbins and stored them in a humidor.  Because with the drop in temperature, the relative humidity also drops and the new humidifier is having a tough time keeping the relative humidity high enough for weaving with something like silk that tends to generate static electricity.  And I want/need to keep the computer assisted dobby happy.

But I'm anxious/excited about getting started on that warp this morning.  The first scarf will be the 'easy' one - intended for publication it will be a four shaft version.  The next one, intended as a gift, I will get to play around a bit.  Fun times!