I can't remember the last time it snowed before Halloween here in the great white north, though, I'm not that old. Also, realization; I need to take more photos in the snow. I have like, two snowy pictures. Here's the thing, I went to visit my Grandmother in south Connecticut having no idea it was going to snow like bonkers. Also, no one who knows me will ever let me live down that the 4 to 4 and half hour drive to Connecticut which then took about 10 hours in the snow on the ride home. Why won't I be allowed to ever forget it? Because my very own father is a meteorologist. And a good one. The harrowing tale, after the jump.
So . . . I had no idea it was even supposed to snow. I had heard a couple rumblings about snow over the weekend, but I of course didn't assume that if it did indeed snow, our lovely capitol would be smacked in the face with 20 or so inches! Yeah. That's right. More than two feet. My Dad has been a New England weatherman for more than 30 years and he's actually good. Definitely a different breed than the 50/50 shot you get from the TV. His work requires accuracy that only experience can bring. So it's not as though he was going to tell me it wasn't going to snow . . . if I had the thought to even call or shoot off an e-mail. The husby and I headed down to see my dear ol' Gram and as soon as we got there, it started snowing. We went out for lunch and the roads were the most slippery I had ever driven on. Though, to be fair, I didn't have my snow tires on . . . HELLO! OCTOBER, HERE.
Sidebar on snow tires. Transplants from lesser states might tell you that they buy all season tires and it ends there. They be WRONG. Unless you have a 4-wheel drive vehicle or have a job (or lack thereof) which doesn't require you to leave the house ever when it snows . . . snow tires are worth every penny. You don't need to buy 4, you don't need to buy the fancy studded ones. It's enough to have 2 on the 'drive' end of your car, which should be the front. Because if you have rear wheel drive, you shouldn't be driving in the snow. Ever. Especially if you live somewhere that has even minimal hills. Just don't. Otherwise, this will happen to you and I will scoff at you and everyone whose way you get in will be annoyed.
There I was, no snow tires on incredibly icy roads. We had lunch. I went out to get my car and pull it around for my Gram. I had to sweep a few inches of snow out of my car, we dropped off my Gram, and fled the scene. It was thankfully not as slippery the whole rest of the ride home as it was when it first started snowing. But it was the slowest, more arduous drive I have ever participated in. Why didn't we just stop? Because I was operating under the delusion that if we took the easterly route, we might eventually out run it. Not exactly realistic when our top speed was 40 mph and our average was about 30. Portions of the highway across Massachusetts, we were blazing the trail. In my baby car (Civic). It was beyond white knuckle the whole way. It was beyond white knuckle for 10 hours. It was ridiculous.
What truly amazed me and the husby was that there were a ton of people out! There was actually a lot of traffic for most of the way! And it wasn't all morons like us who got caught out in a bitchin' winter storm. When we got to Concord, NH at about 11pm, there were people out who had 8-10 inches of snow on their cars. These people had been safely at home that evening (ok, arguably some might have been leaving work, but surely not all of them) and then decided they wanted to go out enough that they brushed 8 inches of snow off their cars and trod off on the unplowed roads. What the hell. Concord, NH isn't exactly a bustling metropolis on the best of Saturday nights. We watched some poor idiot (with rear wheel drive) slide allllllll the way from the far right lane alllllll the way to the far left lane (5 lanes total). They probably moved the car forward about 30 feet, despite moving left three or four times that.
The long and the short of it is that my whole family was appalled to learn that this had happened to me because, as my Dad said, the snow started just when he thought it would and ended dumping just as much snow as he had forecast. Alas, why hadn't I called!? Why hadn't we stopped!? My family was absolutely horrified. And just like that, it was winter. Damn it.
