Archive for January 5th, 2007

Two years ago, it was snow.? We had a LOT of snow.? It started just before New Years and we were slammed again a week later.? That snow hung around for the rest of winter.? And that just doesn’t happen around here.? Maybe someplace like Buffalo, New York or Minnesota, but not HERE.? It was nuts.? That was the winter that I fell and broke my ankle on the ice on our driveway.? Because once you drive on snow on your driveway it turns into ice and you can’t get that off for no body’s business.? Believe me, I tried and I have the scars to prove it.? I, myself, have never seen snow like that here before but I don’t think I’ll see it again.? It was one of those “Once in a Lifetime” type of snows.? Absolutely insane.

Last year, it was rain.? I think we got nothing but rain for about two solid months.? Once again I found myself saying, “I’ve never seen it like this.”? At least it wasn’t snow.? Just rain.? Rain.? And more rain.? And some wind, thrown in for kicks.? That was when we lost four chunks of fence along with three fence posts to boot.? Good times, man.? With a rainy year like that, it was hard to believe that a drought could ever be an issue around here.? It was just WET.? The freaking river downtown flooded (again), for Pete’s sake.

So this year, I was bracing for the worst.? More snow?? Wind?? Rain?? All of the above?? So far, not so much.? We’ve had very little snow, maybe even littler rain.? Some decent wind, but with our new wind preparations, no chunks of fence have been lost.? What we have had, oddly enough considering the lack of precipitation, is ICE.

It seems nearly every time it’s had the audacity to snow around here, we’ve had really bad ice. There was that one time just before Christmas where we got like an inch of snow and everyone lost their nut. In that instance?? Ice.? We’d had rain, the sun went down and the temperature plummeted and it snowed and everything froze.? Boom.? And guess what?? Same thing happened yesterday.? It snowed mostly out here, but in town it was rain.? And, soon as the sun went down, the temperatures took a nosedive.? The local paper said everything really began to get nuts and freeze at about 5:30.? Guess what time Kile left work?? Come on, I bet you can guess.

5:40, of course!? About an hour later, he called me.? He was trying his best to get up the hill from work.? AN HOUR TO GO 100 YARDS.? Even with chains on his van (yes, he had to chain up), he was still sliding around.? And there was traffic up the wazoo (that’s the technical term, mind you).? Because of course, it was rush hour.? Best solution was to shut down North Virginia street, the road Kile normally would take to get to 395 to get home.? That was at 7.? So Kile takes an alternate route over to 395 and guess what?? It’s EVIL.? The news described it as a parking lot.? A really, really slippery parking lot.? Kile said cars were being abandoned right and left along the side of the interstate because they could simply NOT get up the hill.? In the southbound lanes, a semi truck jackknifed, causing that direction to get totally shut down.

Thank god for cellphones, because without them I would have been a total basket-case.? But Kile and I were able to keep in touch with each other as he inched home.? He finally made it home shortly after 9:30.? For those of you keeping track, that’s just about FOUR HOURS.? A 15 minute trip took FOUR HOURS.? God, I love this town.? I appreciate them being on top of things and making sure the roads were being sanded before everything turned into one big sheet of ice.? That was very helpful.? Also helpful was not making sure that the interstate was chains mandatory in areas where there were HILLS.? Way to go, Reno.? Way to go.

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