Stranded

Almost all of Ontario, as well as a lot of places in this part of the world, got a fair bit of snow yesterday. It wasn't the first snow of the year, but it may be the first snow that sticks and was definitely the first big dump of the year.

It wasn't a surprise. The day before the radio had been saying "If you want to leave town, do it now". I couldn't because I had some loose ends at school that I wanted to tie up before I left. So I stayed and waited for the oncoming storm, hoping that as usually seems to happen here, the forecasters would predict a huge storm and it would completely fail to materialize.

My plan had been to leave this morning. This morning the roads were chaos. I decided I'd wait until the roads cleared up. The roads persistently remained chaotic. I'd check the highway status on the web every couple hours. Eventually, I decided that I'd leave when all the sections of highway I needed were open at once. This did not happen until after five. Since it's over a five hour drive, I decided that driving in the dark and the snow didn't seem like a good idea. Especially in my car, which is rear wheel drive and has less then optimal tires on it at the moment.

My car is not a good winter car. It's good in the spring, fantastic in the summer, lots of fun in the fall, but winter... No good. Imagine, if you will, a road with the smallest possible hill on it. Now put an inch of snow on that hill. Most cars, no problem. My car, will slide backwards.

Getting home should be fun.

But it could be a lot worse. Take WereGirl, for example, who is currently sitting stranded somewhere in the Calgary airport. If she is very lucky she may get home for Christmas, in 2005.

Both Mary and SouthernKitten should also be traveling tomorrow. Mary, like WereGirl, by air and SK, like me, by car. I hope they both have better luck.

In fact, a lot of people out there will be traveling tomorrow, if you're driving please be very careful. Especially if you're driving near me.