Here comes the snow!

It's snowing this morning, and we are seeing some accumulation. I'm sick with a sinus infection and I am not leaving the house today! I'm resting all weekend and hope to be better by Monday. I'm lighting a fire and relaxing in my new recliner.

Rain, I love you, but why today?

It's raining, a nice cool fall type rain, not a summer thunderstorm. I love fall! I'm just not a hot weather person. I melt in the heat, especially humid heat. My hair frizzes out. Fall weather makes me happy and I have nice smooth hair.

The only thing that bums me out about the rain is I have an open house scheduled today. It's hard to imagine anyone showing up in the rain, I hope it stops. I guess if anyone does show up, they are a motivated buyer! Why couldn't it rain yesterday when I stayed at home most of the day.

We will still probably have some more hot days, but once it's mid-September it does start getting a lot cooler.

SNOW, this weekend, it did not, not even one tiny flake

Last week everyone was saying that it was going to snow this weekend, we were going to get a storm, it was going to be cold. Well, it didn't! It was a cool spring day, very pleasant. I stayed indoors though. I spend so much time outside for my job, and so much time going all over Syracuse in my car that when I have time off I just want to stay inside with my cats.

On Saturday we were going to go out to dinner and my husband suggested that we try the new Japanese Steak place on Erie Blvd but I didn't want to get in the car even for a ten minute drive! We went to Smoral's on Avery by our house, though we did drive because my husband wanted to. I wanted to walk. And I did write notes for a review of Smorals. It's funny, I said months ago in my blog that I was going to review them and I get a lot of hits on the phrase "review of Smorals" or similar. Well, sorry for the delay and I should have a review up within a week. It is a good place, evidenced by the fact that we keep eating there.

Winter, spring, winter, spring, winter....Summer?

It's hot! Yesterday was 88 degrees. On Thursday I was wearing my winter coat and boots. Did we skip spring or something? It was 88 degrees! Today is only supposed to be 68 though, much more to my taste.

On Thursday I drove by Clinton Square and they were putting water into the fountains there.

It's lovely to see all the flowers blooming and people outside. I dread the summer the way people dread the winter though. I'm really sensitive to the heat. Everyone else will be saying "what a lovely day" and I have sweat dripping in my eyes and a heat rash. Yesterday I was officially ready for fall!

Erie Canal Before Storm

Erie Canal Before Storm, originally uploaded by Melsky.

Yesterday my friend and I were going to meet at the gym and work out, but we decided since it was such a lovely day that we would go for a walk on the Erie Canal Towpath instead. Except that once we got there the sky had turned dark. But behind us were blue skies and light. It was lovely. We only walked for about ten minutes before we got rained out.

Walking through Syracuse

This is downtown Syracuse, where I have been going quite a lot lately.



I got my learner's permit and I've been driving my husband to work downtown every morning, and then walking back home which takes an hour. I bring my camera, there is a lot of old buildings and interesting things to take pictures of on the way.


We had a big thaw and when I walked home on Tuesday I was glad I was wearing my waterproof snow boots because there were huge puddles and mud everywhere.



Yesterday it rained all day but today it's snowing big fat fluffy snowflakes and it's really starting to stick. Please, please, please let it snow enough to go skiing in the park this weekend!

There are two main ways I can walk home, either up James Street or up Erie. James has offices, houses and apartments and it has a sidewalk the whole way. Erie is industrial and crumbling, and does not have sidewalks the whole way, sometimes I have to walk on grass or a parking lot or gravel. But I much prefer the Erie route. There's so much interesting stuff to look at.

It's Back!

The snow is back, making everything look bright and white and happy and clean. For about an hour, then it's drippy, melty, slushy. But hopefully we will have some skiing before too long.



Yesterday my husband and I went to walk at the Erie Canal. There was no snow and it was the perfect day for walking, especially for my husband who hates cold weather. I took a bunch of photos and will put them up tomorrow when I have more time.

Look what showed up today

Yes, it's my pumpkin from last Halloween. It froze last fall and I tossed it out into the yard, thinking I would deal with it at spring thaw when I started composting. It's back, looking like a deflated basketball.



There was a lot of people out on the street in Eastwood today, wearing shorts and t-shirts. This is just what winter is like in Southern California, except there's no piles of snow that hasn't melted yet.

It's nice to be able to walk around without a big coat but would rather do that in the spring and fall and have winter as winter.

What I'm not doing today: Skiing

First it's super-freaking cold with a nice powdery snow, and I get my hopes up, only to be crushed by a thaw with wet mushy snow and mud. Yuck. I got rained on today.

I took a walk to the grocery store, bringing my camera, and found several interesting houses and a hilarious half melted snowman, only to find that my batteries were out.

This from when we had that big storm in December. I missed a Christmas party but at least we got to ski around our neighborhood and at Sunnycrest park.


I really need to go skiing for some exercise. Actually I should just go down to the basement and work on the Nordic Trac. The guy who owns the small gym I go to called and wanted to know where I was! Well, I've been sick, shoveling snow and skiing but I really do need to start lifting weights again and eating right. I was doing really well for a while there. I am going to wait a week or two before going back to the gym because I walked by there the other night and there was a million people in it, probably a lot of new years resolutions folks. I'll go back in the middle of January when the fuss dies down and they're back at home watching TV.

I'm working on a collage/assemblage/mixed media piece with stuff I found on the streets while walking around. The best thing so far is the front plate of an old camera. The working title is Found in Syracuse.

Snow, Snow, Snow and cold

It's minus 2 degrees! The snow is all powder, in fact this morning I swept it off the driveway and sidewalk instead of using a shovel. For the first time, I had to come in before I finished the driveway because my toes and hands were getting cold and started to hurt.

I think I'm almost over my cold and tomorrow I'm going skiing at the park. I would almost do it today, except I'm kind of busy. Tonight I'm going to an art opening - it's a Jackson Pollack exhibit that my husband's work is putting on. I'm excited that I get to go, that I'm not still sick and we are not having a giant blizzard or something.

Another Syracuse based item: wings. I had some great wings the other day, from OIP (which stands for Original Italian Pizza). We had pizza too. I'd actually tried their pizza when I attended the Christmas tree lighting for the Eastwood tree. They had a little party afterwards with pizza from OIP and coffee from Cafe Kubal. I had also smelled the wings cooking at the new Eastwood location while I was at the hardware store and was tempted to get them, but I had stuff in the crock pot at home.

The pizza is decent, thin crust the way I like it but nothing to write home about. The wings, on the other hand, you can write to home about them. They were great. When I was deciding where to order from, I did a search on OIP and a surprising amount of reviews from people popped up praising their char grilled wings. So I got a large cheese pizza and 18 char grilled wings. They were amazing, just the right amount of crispyness with a slight smoky flavor. My husband does not like wings much so I figured with 18 of them, I would be eating them for a few days. Wrong! They were gone that same night and Mr. Idon'tlikewings ate half of them.

Sniffle

This is the window at Freedom of Espresso, a coffee house in Armory Square. I go there most times I go downtown.

We've been having warm weather and a major thaw. Most of the snow is gone and it's easy to walk on the sidewalks. I'm getting a cold though, so I won't be doing much walking. I'm glad I got sick during a thaw though, because if it was good skiing weather I'd be really annoyed.

One of my goals for the new year is to work on some paintings of Syracuse, which will be mostly buildings. I also need to start getting out and doing more stuff. It's even easier to stay at home here, because I have such a nice big house, compared to Toronto, and such a hard time going places without a car, compared to Toronto. For example, I know that some of my acquaintances that I've met through my neighbor go to yoga classes, but I can't go because you can't get there without a car.

An introduction.

My name is Melsky and I'm an artist. I live in the Eastwood neighborhood of Syracuse, NY.

I moved here last August from Toronto. Before I lived in Toronto I lived in Wonder Valley, an isolated part of the Mojave Desert. Before that, San Diego, San Francsico and Los Angeles.

Though I grew up in California, I always liked cold weather, changing seasons, fall leaves, spring flowers and big old brick houses with attics and basements. The things I don't like - summer humidity and the fact that it's not a good town to walk in. I miss Toronto for that. I miss interacting on a street level with other pedestrians. The only place where I can have anything like that would be downtown or in a mall, and it's really not the same.

Anyway, this blog is about my experiences, art, and photography in Syracuse.