SnowPocalypse

Once upon a time, my rehearsal in Milwaukee was canceled, and our work call ended at 5:30, but instead of going straight home, Justin and I went to Dustin and Jim's for Taco Tuesday. My car was parked in a garage during dinner and the roads were fine when we started to drive home. Even the big bridge by the lake was fine. I took the exit I normally take, but the surface road had been wind-blown into snow drifts which were too deep for my little car to handle.

At about 12:15am, Wednesday morning my car got stuck in a snow drift and could not get out. I had no shovel in my car, but Justin lived only 1 mile away, so he started walking home in horizontally blowing snow (which would continue for 6 more hours).

By 1am, two other cars were stuck near me and a patrol car came by to tell me we'd all be there for a while. I texted Justin that he should stay inside when he arrived home (the walk had taken him an hour).

A number of things happened throughout the course of the blizzard night in my car: an emergency vehicle attempted to nudge me into a clear roadway but failed, so I called AAA. 3 times. The first time I called AAA was at about 2am. I was on hold for over 45 minutes before the woman told me I could not have a tow truck dispatched because the roads were "impassable" and AAA did not cover that.

Starting at 2am, I ran the car for 10 min at the top of each hour and then dozed off and on until the next hour. At 4am, I saw the first plows, so I called AAA again and after 30 min on hold they took my request for a tow truck and put an urgent note on it since I'd already been waiting 4.5 hours. At 7:20, I had not seen a tow truck, but the previously plowed roads had been wind-blown, so I called AAA to get an update and express my concern about the possibly impassable roads.

In the meantime, Justin started walking back toward me and my car at around 7:30am, and I expected him at around 8:20. At 8:15, there were 2 Marines or Coast Guard guys with pick-ups who arrived and helped get me into a drive-able lane. Justin arrived shortly after, shovel in hand, and we helped get another car out of the snow and on her way. We drove towards home, parked on an already-plowed main street and walked thru knee-high snow home, arriving at 9am. When I called AAA to cancel my tow truck at 8:30, their automated system told me my tow truck was over 2 hours away. At the earliest, the tow truck may have arrived at approximately 8.5 hours after my initial call.

And so we come to February. Snowmageddon sucked a lot, but having survived blizzard conditions alone in my car for 8 hours, I feel (not only a whole lot of exhausted, but) a whole lot stronger and more prepared for The Future.

(NOTE: Today, I bought a shovel and salt and toe warmers to keep in my car along with my Tuxtiles blanket.)