I stopped in the local hardware store the other day. The leaves aren’t all off the trees yet, but the snow throwers are all on display. (Some folks call them snow blowers. Others call them snow throwers.) You can call me anything but late for dinner (after I’ve thrown out my back shoveling snow the old-fashioned way).

Enough shoveling, already! I’ve had my eye on a wicked-cool Troy-Bilt track-drive snow thrower for a while now. Too long, even.

Needless to say, it hasn’t happened yet. No Troy-Bilt, no nothing. I still slobber over the Honda track-drive, at roughly double the price. I kick myself for not picking up barely-used bargain-priced Honda I saw in a moving sale last year.

I snoozed. I lost. One of these years, I’ll get that snow thrower of my dreams.

My kid, on the other hand, doesn’t want a snow thrower… he wants an ATV with a plow. Industrious whippersnapper that he is, he figures that a rig could earn him fifty bucks a driveway. If I had a bankroll, I might bankroll him. I keep threatening to set him up in his own business, College Fund Landscaping. (Keeping in mind how much it hurt that time he weed-whacked my ankle, and how peeved I was when he drove my tractor into the split-rail fence. Twice.)

Until those first flakes fall, I’ll stave off the chills while thinking those warm sauna thoughts, and hold out on dragging the portable radiator from the basement to the office. I’ll make sure the south window shades are pulled up on those sunny days, to soak up the free solar heat. I’ll put on the thickest pair of socks I can find, and pull on a sweater (or two). I’ll warm my hands over the old CRT monitor on my PC. I’ll pretend the plasma TV is really a big flat space heater. (Come to think of it, we don’t have to pretend…)

On the bright side, heating oil’s about a dollar a gallon less than it was last year. I waited until the last minute before filling up our tank (just days before Election Day, no less).

[tags]snow thrower, snow blower, ATV plow[/tags]