Friday - mid-afternoon

When I got up there - Gurdon to the plant - today I went straight to the glue pit manager and had a discussion. It turns out, they ordered 4 truckloads today.  I don't even know how our company pulled that off, but apparently they did.  He said Sunday's load will be canceled.  When he says that, he means that the load loading on Saturday is nixed, load on Saturday deliver to them on Sunday.

That means I am off the hook for the weekend without having to put up a fight.  

My mind on the way back was fully on finishing preparations for this impending ice storm.  They are calling it Snowmageddon, but snow has very little to do with this. This is an ICE storm, not a snow storm.  Ice storms are inherently more treacherous and dangerous and almost guaranteed there will be power outages.  

Power what was on my mind. I thought, if we are running 4 space heaters, 2 fridges, a freezer and other small appliances and lights off of one generator, is that generator going to be able to handle that much output?

I decided that it probably wouldn't and I went straight to my CAT generator when I got home.  I brought the battery charger from the park home with me, I figured by now the battery would be dead.  I was very surprised that the battery not only wasn't dead, but seemed fully charged!  It hasn't been run in quite a while!

It took me ever further aback to find out that the thing fired right up! Like maybe 20 seconds of cranking. I was prepared to give it a shot of ether, but it said no sir, I don't need that.  So, I filled the thing up with fresh fuel, went to the gas station and refilled the now empty 5 gallon can and then started looking for extension cords.  

These are all things I don't want to be doing in the middle of the night. It's going to get cold tonight and if that power goes out, I want it as easy as possible to just go out there, fire those things up, plug in extension cords, feed them into the house and get it over with so we can start running space heaters quickly to keep the heat in the house that's already there. 

I'm desperately hoping that the power does not go out, but I am fully and I do mean fully prepared for it if it does. There will be no guess work or wondering if machinery is going to start, I won't be frantically searching for cords, I won't have to be going to the gas station multiple times, it's all done.  I ran both machines for 30 minutes just to be sure that they aren't going to give me hiccups, for there was a man advertising in the local gossip page that he is ready and willing to come out wherever right now and see if he can get your generator going.  

Now? I just got done doing dishes and loading the dishwasher. We will not be starting a weekend with this possibility in front of us without having ALL the dishes cleaned.  Start out with a clean slate on that department and I have my bedding in the washing machine, it's the last of my stuff I wanted to wash, the rest of my clothing is clean, thank you very much.  

I'm preparing this more for the mom and 2 young kids more than I am doing it for myself. I wouldn't like it, but I could just go through a night without heat and just deal with it in the morning.  I've done my share of winter tent camping in frigid temps with no heat beyond the campfire which, obviously, you aren't dragging into your tent at night to keep you warm. You wake up in the morning nice and warm under the covers, knowing that in a few seconds? You are going to freeze your balls off to get up, get a fire going and have some warmth burning.  When I was younger I went camping all the time. It was my go to for recreation and it didn't cost anything more than the fuel to get where I was going to.

Those were poorer days and I did what I could to  keep life interesting.  

I haven't tent camped in a long, long time.  

I'm getting tired of looking at the forecast but I can't help myself. Start driving again on Monday?!!  It's going to get VERY cold Sunday night into Monday morning and all of that ice? Will not have had a chance to thaw, it will never come up above freezing even after the freezing rain stops!  I"m play that one by ear.  They want a very inexperienced driver to load on Sunday, which I find amazing. Amazingly poor decision, the company knows he's not highly experienced in severe weather driving in a truck, but they are going to dump it on him anyway? It's going to be freezing rain the ENTIRE DAY!

You know, at the end of all of this preparation? I hope nothing happens. The power doesn't go out, the plant stays shut down TRHOUGH Monday, the streets might become dangerous around here, but if they do? We don't have to go anywhere.  I'm guessing they'll shut down the Sunday service, they've done that before in inclement weather that wasn't even remotely as bad as what's being forecasted here.  The only thing I might miss is Applebee's, who promises they are going to be open and is less than a mile away. 

But a mile can be treacherous under the right conditions.   

I'm ending this one. We are doing our Friday thing and going out to eat.  Nothing fancy, just a day that I personally have exhausted myself both with trucking and then all of this prep nonsense. The bad stuff isn't coming until the middle of the night and I kind of think I won't sleep well wondering if the power is going to go out and so, I will enjoy a meal before the storm.  

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