SnowJam2014

Like many, MANY people in the ATL, I spent a looooooong time--8.5 hours WITHOUT a potty break, which is really like 205 bladder hours--in my car last Tuesday trying to get home in the snow and ice. In that 8.5 hours, which started at 12:45 p.m., I ate a handful of tiny little chocolate candies that I grabbed out of my desk, just in case it took me a couple of hours to get home--because I hadn't had lunch yet. And no water--but that was actually okay, since I had nowhere to pee.

Here's the first indication (besides, you know, the fact that I wasn't moving very fast on the interstate and it was snowing) that I wasn't going to get home for a while:


Yes, that does say it's going to take 89-91 minutes to go 9 miles. But, it lied. It took me more than three hours. I'm not sure how many minutes that is, but I know it's more than 89-91.


Here's my view for most of the ride.


Here's the Delk Road exit (the one mentioned on the sign in the first photo). It was about 4:30 by this time. Nearly four hours since I'd left my office.


It was all fun and games until it got dark. Actually, that picture makes it look prettier than it was. Not only was I stuck in my car for-freakin'-ever, but I felt like I missed all the pretty snow. Snow ain't pretty on the interstate. And it was all done falling by the time I got home.


Here's my car clock, 7 hours into the journey--boredom and ridiculousness had clearly set in by this time.

After 8.5 hours in the car, I gave up. I crested a hill, about a mile from my house, and watched several cars slide to the bottom of the other side. And I was done. My car spent the night in a restaurant parking lot, and I walked the last mile home.
9:45 p.m. I've never been so glad to see the place in my whole life.

And I was luckier than the many who didn't get home that night at all. I know people who slept on buses, in Target, in their cars, at a stranger's house. A friend was forced to turn my sister's snow yellow at 4 a.m., because she was still a mile from home and just couldn't wait any more. Even had an acquaintance, who couldn't get home, spend the night at the Beach House.

Granted, there were some nice stories of people delivering food and water to folks stranded in their cars or opening their homes for potty breaks (clearly this became an important issue for me). But, really, it sucked for whole lot of people.

Made me glad to see the more normal Georgia winter weather return just three days later.

Comments

Anonymous said…
pretty nice blog, following :)
12:45 PM
Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Donkey with a death wish

Image
At the edge of the caldera, in the tiny town of Fira, on Santorini, my sister, Susan, and I peered out at the Agean Sea, marveling at a blue they created just for Greece. Our eyes traveled to donkeys ferrying people and things up from the boats docked at the old port below. I don’t remember which of us thought it would be fun to hike the zigzagged path to the port, then ride a donkey back up, but it was a terrible, scary, asinine, stupid idea. It was still fairly early in the morning when we started down the thousands of wide, uneven, cobblestone, horror-movie steps. But the sun that beat on the island in August didn't have a clock. We'd finished our water and worked up a sweat before we hit the half-way point. At the port we poked into gift shops, bought a couple of trinkets and drank more water before seeking out our animal transport. We climbed a few steps, handed over our money and sat down on the next donkey that waited beside the top step. A mother and her two
Read more

Nana goes to college

Image
My Nana died a week ago today. She was 92 years old and lived, at least as far as I knew, a full, wonderful life, though she certainly had her share of hardship. She left behind three daughters (my mother included), eight grandchildren and 14 great-grandchildren. We were all at the burial and memorial service in Charlotte, NC, this past Friday. Five of the eight grandchildren spoke about Nana at the service. And I learned that she apparently thought we were all as special as I know I was to her. That was the theme that ran through all five of our stories. Here's what I said about her. I knew from early on that Nana loved me, not in some abstract, send me a card with money in it for Christmas kind of way, but in a concrete way that made me know she wanted me around. She introduced me to her friends. She wanted to know mine. She was a part of my life. I took all of that for granted until my freshman year of college. I was at Emory, living in a dorm that had been built in the 1920s. I
Read more

The cats who killed Christmas

Image
Free to BAD home , three cats who killed our Christmas tree! The crime: Close-up of the victim: The carnage: Last gasp of pink Christmas lights: Death of the flamingos-pulling-Santa's-sleigh ornament. My very favorite one, hand painted by my cousin Tina. The suspects: Dusty, the ringleader Stewie, the muscle Miss Kitty, the brains behind the operation Approach these felines carefully. They are considered clawed and dangerous!
Read more