Everyone get home ok? We need the snow!

[Elhuero]

it's the global warming

[Irving]

That was me Stuart, I always honk at you.

Well the dumb air horn you installed on your POS green Land Rover startled me and could have made me lose control.

[theGinsue]

I left work @ 1300 today to try to get home in front of all of this. I did, but just barely.

I drove my POS Celica commuter with okay tires for normal dry roads and promptly parked it next to my house for the weekend at about 1345. The roads were still almost completely clear.

As I got in the door, my wife wanted to go to Sams Club and Wally World to get some things we "needed". She asked if we were taking the Celica or my F250. I asked if she thought we'd be home within an hour. No. F250 it was.

At 1400 I got the truck cleaned off (starting to accumulate already) and warmed up and off we went to Sams Club first. By 1415 we were @ Woodman and Union (those of you in COS know this area - roller coaster hills) and it was slick as snot - I even felt a touch of sliding as I came to a stop. I heard word later that about this same time there was a 20 car wreck @ Union and Dublin (just 1/4 from where I had been).

Amazingly, I got my wife into the guy "commando shopping" mode @ Sams and we were back in the truck in about 10 minutes. It was COVERED in snow. Now to Wally World.

There were a few cars that felt the safest place for them to be was immediately on my rear bumper (no, they didn't hit me, but that wasn't for a lack of trying - I hate tailgaters). And I had to get up a big hill whilst in a short line of traffic behind the leading cars that didn't seem to realize that you have to have SOME speed and momentum to get up a slick snow covered road or you'll never reach the top. Like the folks nogaroheli dealt with, these folks felt 5mph was a proper speed.

We eventually made it to Wally World, and some guy came and asked if I had jumper cables he could borrow. The wife went in to start the shopping while I tried to help this gent. We never did get that vehicle to start - wouldn't even try to turn over. I joined the wife, finished the shopping and stood in line for 5 minutes with just one shopper ahead of us. The cashier was the most inefficient, slowest moving, blabber mouthed person I've ever suffered though at a WalMart (and that is saying something). I think we spent more time in line and getting checked out than we did shopping (almost 10 minutes). Maybe this is just a new WalMart tactic to get people to want to use the self-checkouts.

We finally made it home with no further delays or adventures and that's where I decided we would all stay for the rest of the night. - Nice and cozy @ home.

Now, I've got to help get some decent tires on my daughters Escape that she bought in November so I can feel safe about her driving to work in this sort of mess.

Yes, I ALWAYS use my lights in bad weather conditions or if I have to use my wipers (carry over from obeying the IL law that requires it).

[Dr_Fwd]

And this is just a beginning...

[spyder]

I have a post every year explaining how if you are driving in ANY conditions that require you to use your windshield wipers, but don't have your headlights on, you are a fucking retard. Personally, I drive with my lights on at all times anyway. Nothing drives me more crazy than stupid people driving in the snow and/or rain with no headlights on.

Automatic headlights...

[Bailey Guns]

-11 at 0630 on Crow Hill in Bailey. About 5" of global warming since yesterday afternoon.

[Jumpstart]

Anyone know actual weather/road conditions in Woodland Park as of 6:40 this a.m.? We are in NM and leave tomorrow morn for WP, unless roads are not worthy of travel.

[Byte Stryke]

Anyone know actual weather/road conditions in Woodland Park as of 6:40 this a.m.? We are in NM and leave tomorrow morn for WP, unless roads are not worthy of travel.

seriously its supposed to be Icy cold and snowy
Todays High is in the Low 20s
Lows -2
roads are expected to be Shitty but passable

[roberth]

Idiots abound.

I was driving when it started yesterday. I saw 5 accidents in a 20 minute ride and then some fucktard tries to turn into me at a double left turn lane. I was in the left left and she was in the right left, guess she forgot that it is a double turn lane and steered right into my lance, good thing I EXPECT that kind of thing.

I am bunkered in at home, won't come out until Sunday probably.

[BPTactical]

I hate this white crap!
I haven't even left the house aside to shovel the back for the dogs. Screw the mailman, he can slog through it for another day.

After plowing the highways in the metro area for 18+ years it is nice not to have to do it anymore.
If I had the desire to wear out my keyboard I could relay some of the crazy stuff I have seen over the years of driving a plow.
A couple of favorites:

Watching as the lead truck hits a driveshaft lying next to the Jersey barrier with a plow. Watching as said driveshaft exits the right side of the plow and punch right through a quarter panel of some dumb ass that tried to pass the plows on the right side.

Plowing 36 @ 0300 and coming upon a vehicle doing about 3mph with the interior light on. I go to pull around him and look over and this clown (literally-in clown makeup and garb) has sheet music on the steering wheel and is playing the clarinet. WTF??

Pulling up to the light on the I-76 and Federal off ramp. Black van next to me and there are porn mags all over the interior opened up. About a 48EEE bra stretched out over the steering wheel and the driver is about 350#+ and "pleasuring" himself. EEWWW!!

Deriving a sick and twisted pleasure from watching the Tejano F150's with their wide tires and wheels not be able to move an inch in 1/2" of snow.

Caving in the windsheid of a Westminster PD car with the officer in it. He was in a little turnout that used to be at about 100th and Wadsworth. This turnout had evergreen trees around it and you could not see the cruiser. I am cruising about 35MPH clearing the shoulder and it is wet, sloppy and heavy slush. By the time I saw him it was too late and I could not lift the plow quick enough. Blasted him and it put the windshield in his lap. I stopped and while it scared the crap out of him he was OK. We did all the paperwork and he actually laughed about it and said he would never camp out there during a storm again.

Getting pulled over by a rookie Broomfield officer for "driving too fast for conditions". I was doing about 25MPH on 120th east of Sheridan about 0400 plowing away and minding my own business. Red and Blues come on behind me so I pull aside to let him pass. I was quite surprised to see him pull in behind me and really surprised when he comes up and asks me for my DL. I asked him why he pulled me over and he told me I was driving too fast for the conditions. I started laughing aloud and he got pissed and told me he was going to write me for it. I told him to call his Supervisor which he did. Sarge pulls up and he is not happy with the officer. Sarge comes up to me and asks what is up and I told him what the story was. Sarge asks me how long I have been with CDOT. Eleven years I told him and he gets a sly smile on his face. It was real clear the Sarge did not think much of the rookie and told him to come up and write me. Rookie complies and before his pen hits paper the Sarge tells him how this would end up: I get the ticket, I go to court, Rookie goes to court, I tell the Judge that I have plowed for 11 years and I am very well qualified to evaluate road conditions, Judge agrees and case is dropped. Sarge proceeds to tell the rookie that unless a plow runs over a pack of nuns or school kids to leave us alone and how CDOT has a good relationship with PD and he doesn't want an eager beaver ruining that.

The sick, demented pleasure of watching patrons of RTD run in terror from a bus stop when they see a plow clearing the right lane throwing a 50' rooster tail coming straight at them.

The same sick and demented pleasure watching the relief on their face when you lift the plow 10' before the bus stop.

You guys gripe about spending an hour in traffic to get home in this crap. Yeah, it is aggravating.
Now think about the guys in the plows. We spend 12 hours at a minimum in it, trying to make it safe for yall to get home. You get home from a 12- 16 hour snowshift and you are totally wiped out. You spend the entire time in the truck, worrying about a 14' plow, 20,000 pounds of de-icer, 38,000 pounds of truck, your other trucks plowing with you, trying to remember every curb bullnose and bridge expansion joint or anything else that would tear up a plow, monitoring a two way, 10,000 idiots around you that can't drive, 10,000 other idiots in 4x4's that think they can drive and realizing that Omaha orange trucks have an affinity for attracting every sliding and slipping vehicle to it like a tractor beam.
Give em a little space and don't try to pass them on the right!