Hubby likes to hold on to old shabby clothes too, if it's holey I rip it more and use it for a rag, or he wears it when working on the vehicles. Today we took the dog for a walk in the park for the first time in awhile, since he's been ailin', was in the twenties, but sunny. We're to get more snow and colder temps tonight, and headed for single digit highs in a couple of days.
After that hubby went over to his friends house for awhile, and I was headed off to the gym. Our neighbor from across the street came to me for help with clearing his sidewalk, as he was just issued a warning from the city. He is disabled, appears to have Downs Syndrome, and the son of two of the people who rent the house. He showed me his hands, and said they were freezing. They were all red. I asked him if he had any gloves, and he said no. I gave him a new pair of gripper brown work gloves.
So I headed across the street to help him out, but he said they had no shovel there. The sidewalk was iced over very badly, as we've been having snow, slightly melting from the sun, then icing up again due to temps and additional snows. Well, I brought over our 2 plastic shovels, but that wasn't going to cut it...the ice was too thick and hard, especially where they've been driving in and out of their driveway. It ticked me off, because there are at least 3 adults living there, if not more. This young man looked around 20, and was very upset with the threat of being fined by the city.
Anyhoo, I had one newer shovel that had a metal edge on it, and we took turns chipping away at the built up ice to clear the sidewalk. He was overweight, and I noticed he was getting very out of breath easily, so I did the majority of the work. I asked him if he had asthma, and he said no, but he had trouble breathing. I've waved and said hello to this young man since they moved in, but the other household members are not very friendly, no waves or hellos.
It took over an hour, kind of like making a tiny spot in an iced windshield, and scraping out from that cleared spot. We finally got the job done, and I had my work for the day...cancelled my gym plans. I had him keep the gloves and the shovel, and explained how they needed to clear the snow early in the day when it was soft, and never let it build up like that for a difficult removal. It's a shame the adults in the house didn't ask to borrow a shovel if they needed one. Well, hopefully it won't get that bad for them (or him) again.
