Rubber Baby Buggy Bumpers

I am sure that by now, all of you have heard of the The Big Winter Storm that swept through the South at the beginning of this week. Hold that thought for a second while I go find some wood to knock on, because I may regret my next sentence.

I have an incredible propensity for dodging inclimate weather during winter. And this week was no exception.

I was able to get out of Atlanta before the storm hit. Arriving in Baltimore, in was a balmy 40 degrees with brilliant blue skies. I had a few deliveries in Pennsylvania and was able to make it back to Dublin, Virginia just in time to settle in for the night. The local forecast was calling for somewhere between 1-2" or 4-6" of fresh snow, depending on who you talked to. I was already a little nervous about being so close to home, so early in the week. It was only Monday night and the storm was still actively proceeding east. Lucky for me, I was a tad bit further north than the trajectory of this particular system. However, I also heard tales that Fancy Gap was a nightmare and was only getting worse. Fancy Gap was only 40 miles away, so, with that in mind, I snuggle down for the night. No alarm clocks set, because I was completely resigned to waking up in a winter wonderland and even though I was only 7 hours from home, I fully expected a full days drive in getting there.

I woke up, raring to go. Noticing that there was only about a half inch of snow outside of my windshield, I decided to get the party started.

Still a little anxious, I make my way down Fancy Gap... No problems, no ice, no fresh snow. The roads were immaculate and continued to remain that way, all the way through South Carolina.

That is until.....

I decided to pull into our shop located in Greer, SC for a little fuel and some new wiper blades. The shop is located on a little county road. With the Interstates being so well maintained, it never crossed my mind what the county roads looked like, or that the shop might actually be closed. The county road ended up being coated in about 3" of solid ice.

I slowly make my way down the road, trying to gauge my distance so that I will not have to stop in order to make my left turn. But I suppose my presence on this little county road was too much for the other vehicles. An approaching car decided to stop and watch me, which in turn made me have to apply the brakes so I would not miss my turn into the terminal driveway. Blasted FourWheelers !!

I had no problem stopping. However, after the car passed me, I found that inertia was not on my side. "A tendency for an object at rest, to remain at rest " I locked in my differential and found a superlow gear, but the moment I applied fuel, my ass end decided to slide to the right, straight into the piney perimeter of this little lane. Of course, inertia once again finished me off, dragging the rest of my tractor off the beaten path as well. Grrrrrr!! There was nothing left to do at this point, AND the terminal WAS CLOSED.

Having made it 1500 miles thus far with absolutely no treacherous road conditions, the only thing left to do was laugh at myself for getting stuck so close to home.

Within a matter of minutes, I looked up to see a Big Truck Wrecker ambling towards me. Oh, the sheer luck of it all. He stopped to ask if I was immobile, duh !! , and offered his services. He was on his way to extract 4 other trucks from similar predicaments around town and promised to return as quick as he could, which only turned out to be about an hour.

Disaster averted, I was able to get my fuel, meander back out to the Interstate and commence heading towards the house, hammer down. It wasn't until I reached Commerce, Ga that I first saw signs of trouble on the the Interstate. From this point, travel was reduced to one lane in each direction with quite a few icy patches.

Upon entering the city, I was notified that parts of 285 were still closed and all southbound 85 traffic was to be diverted through downtown. At rush hour, even. But alas, most residents were still safe and snuggled up at home, so there was still very few cars out on the roads. The overpasses were fubar, but I managed to make it home with no more issues.

The 7 hours trip (under normal circumstances) ended up only taking 9 hours and that was with the snafu I experienced in South Carolina. So all is well that ended well.

Here is a little video I found to illustrate a small portion of what I did, in fact, miss out on !! Good Times !