Friday - early morning

The weather forecast hasn't changed at all.  It specifically states to consider delaying any travel and that traveling is highly discouraged.  It also states near the I-20 corridor - I am 3 plus miles from I-20 - there will be significant ice accumulations.  The forecast for accumulated ice went from below .50 to almost an inch.  

If we get an inch of ice, traveling will be the least of my worries, I won't even consider it. In fact, later on today I'm basically telling my manager I'm not going to drive in those conditions.  I will send him the warnings from various including the government agencies.  I will also be asking the plant manager today if I see him what his plans are?  Are you actually going to be open up here?  

They are going to have temperatures in the teens, forecast 1 to 10 inches of snow depending on where you're at, predictions of extremely hazardous driving conditions, especially on bridges with them potentially freezing over and becoming slick.

The bridge alert was given to us in my town as well.  I don't have to worry about any of that for my drive today.  It is cool out but nothing ridiculous, there is a 15% chance of rain, I'm good. I have no idea why that other driver requested to drop the load on to someone else, there is no more danger during the daytime today than any other normal day.  It's tonight is when all the ridiculousness occurs.  

I can tell you, I'm more concerned about being away from the house with the endless predictions that if there is an inch of ice, you need to prepare for the high possibility that power lines will come down and power poles will break from the sheer weight of the ice attached to it and extended periods of time without power.  

Yes the generator is working, I fired it up yesterday, I'm taking this seriously. I have never seen these kinds of forecasts and warnings in this area, not like this.  Tornado warnings come like this occasionally, but nothing like these ice predictions.  You can't be messing with mother nature, she will win every single time.  You have to prepare for her and hope you can ride out whatever she throws at you.  There are many people in this town that are downplaying this weather.  They have a reason of sorts: the forecasters are frequently wrong here. 

But as far as I see it, this is far different.  You have multiple sources, even the storm chasers whose business it is to find bad weather and find those tornadoes or whatever they're looking for -all saying they now believe these predictions aren't guess work, it's going to happen. 

I informed my manager a few days ago that if the predictions hold true, I will not be driving on ice. I will drive on snow, but I refuse to drive on ice. I literally don't care what the ramifications are, if that means go find a new job, that will also mean I will be reporting that company to the Feds.  They cannot force me to drive in unsafe conditions, this is literally the law and the law even specifies that they cannot take punitive action such as holding back work or threatening to fire someone.  

This company knows this hence the reply I received. All well and fine, I was simply making my intentions known. I want to be home during this nonsense in case the power goes out, I can get us all fixed up with the generator and power cords running everywhere to get space heaters fired up, some lighting, probably keep the internet going (plugging in the router),  connecting the indoor refrigerators and freezer.  We have an outdoor freezer that will need no power, it will never get warm enough for anything in there to even start thawing once the frigid cold hits.

What I'm doing here writing all of this stuff is asserting to myself, after all I've been reading and finding nothing has changed this morning, nothing at all about the forecast that I am in the right here, I am not making things up, I'm not looking for an excuse not to go to work.  If this situation is bad enough, I won't even be going to church on Sunday if I'm not working.  I won't leave the house, that's the end of that story.  My ducks are in a row, my i's have been dotted and t's crossed, I am not expecting to work this weekend and they can go jump in an icy cold lake if they think they are going to coerce me into doing it.  

Now, this talk and banter may all be for nothing.  The plant my ultimately decide to cancel loads and shut down the plant. They've done that several times in the past during inclement weather that was nothing close to what's coming to them up there this weekend.  My company may also say sorry, we can't do this, but they probably won't.  I covered my @$$, tho, I told them I won't do it and that's that.

Now can I move on? No, not until this event is over with, it's pretty much consumed me. As for now? I need to get ready to leave.

G'day