Where's Paul Bunyan when you need him?

As winter approaches, I keep telling myself I can handle this in hopes that I'll start believing it. So far, results are mixed.

Can I handle the mouse problem on my own? Cold nights inspire all kinds of creatures to find a warm place to spend the winter, so at this time of year I expect to catch mice in traps two or three times a week until the first hard freeze hits, and I'm going to have to get used to emptying the traps (yuck) and then resetting them, a task my klutzy fingers fear. Can I do it? It's hard to say since I've thus far caught no mice at all, even though last night one came boldly running through the living room while I was in there reading. Time to set some traps over behind the living-room plants, where at this time last year we caught three or four mice in a couple of days' time. Can I set the traps without snapping them shut on my fingers? If you don't hear from me for a while, send the Saint Bernards (although how they would help dislodge my fingers from a mousetrap I don't know.)

And what about heat? Can I handle the wood-burner on my own? My husband assures me that he's been cutting wood in smaller chunks so I can lift them from the pile, carry them to the wood-burner, and toss 'em in, but even the smaller chunks are pretty heavy, and if I use up all the smaller chunks in this relatively mild weather, then in the dead of winter I'll be stuck with nothing but piles of wood so heavy that it's all I can do to knock 'em off the woodpile and roll 'em to the wood-burner--but then how can I lift them and throw them in on the hot coals? I have to prop a log on the edge of the opening and shove it in with my whole body, but if I shove too far, I'll singe my hair. (Don't ask me how I know that, and if the smell of burnt hair bothers you, don't visit my office today.)
 
And what about snow? I have learned to push the mower and run the weed-whacker and I'm happy to drive the tractor around if someone else starts it up for me, but my response when the tractor does anything untoward (like overheat) is to walk away and let my husband handle it. I just don't want to know how to maintain the tractor and I don't trust myself to maneuver it up and down our driveway when it's covered with snow this winter. Go ahead and recommend a snowblower, but we're talking about a very steep gravel driveway two tenths of a mile long--how would I push it up the hill, or prevent it from sliding down? This sounds like a job for a neighbor, and since all my neighbors have tractors with plow blades, I guess I'll need to work out what kind of barter I can arrange. Homemade cookies in exchange for occasional plowing? I can do that.

I resist the idea that I'm helpless to manage problems that arise, but I'm also a realist. I see winter bringing a set of challenges I'll struggle to face, and the prospect makes me want to crawl back into bed, pull the covers over my head, and hibernate for a few months--if the stupid mice will quiet down enough to let me sleep.  

I'm supposed to throw that in there? In your dreams.

"Little pieces," he said. Ha!