Sunday - late morning

I didn't bother to roll out of bed until 10 am, there was no reason to and might as well sleep in. 

Church is closed today and so is Applebee's, so our weekly routine is disrupted - as expected.

Some "stuff" fell out of the sky last night, it looks like snow but it's more like a frozen slushees drink. It's hard and not soft or powdery at all like if it was fresh snow that had fallen.

I looked at the road conditions going south - the road I "will" be taking tomorrow to get to the plant and they are in horrid conditions if the gps is correct and it usually is. There are red lines all the way down there.

Yes, I know that's tomorrow but it will never get above freezing today.  It's 21 degrees, feels like 10 according the weather channel, will get up to 26 today and then plummet back down into the teens tonight.  

So, even if the roads are being driven on, they will not be much traveled overnight meaning any slush created by people traveling on them today will turn back into solid ice overnight. Around 6:30 am, leaving in that stuff?  It doesn't sound safe to me.  I'll check again later on today, my company probably doesn't care if I have to drive. I'm actually going to try to get into my vehicle and rive over to the park if possible. 

I don't have 4 wheel drive and I don't have any kind of winter tires on it.  This is not normal weather for around here, we don't spend money on things like winter studded tires or even chains for that matter.  My truck does have chains for both the tractor and trailer. You can't drive very fast with them on, a 1=1/2 hour trip will turn into many hours going that slow if I were to try that.  

And watching a video of chain installation since I haven't done it in a long, long time, it's a PITA.  I don't have the bungee cords needed to hold the chains tight and I don't think I have the chain tightening tool anywhere, don't remember seeing one anyway.  If you don't have those items along with the chains, the chains will not be tight and they will just fall off the tires.  -

Anyway, this is basically another nothing day. The kids are out front playing in that stuff, I have no desire to go outside at least not right now.  I was out yesterday for a few hours and had a little fun throwing ice balls, that's what they really are, but I haven't been anywhere since Friday afternoon.  I'm wondering if management will even bother to ask me if I think the roads are going to be safe to drive? Because if they called about it right now, I would inform them of the icy road conditions and then refer them to the red lines on GPS. 

______________

That was many, many hours ago. It's now 11:30 pm.  Our street never changed, it's a sheet of ice with some powdery snow on top of it - very little of the powdery snow. The lady of the house didn't have any crack so I mentioned to the boys about walking to the store? Umm, I'm not talking about crack cocaine, it's her reference to a Monster drink, perfectly legal lol.

I didn't say why we might go and I certainly wasn't forcing it on them during a real-feel of 11 degrees, but they got all excited! WALK TO THE STORE? YESSSSSS! That was totally unexpected, at the same time, they have been pent up in the house for days. Yes they have gone out front and played in the ice snow, but not the same as getting out from the house.  

So, I called the store - grocery store - to ensure they were opened. Yup, we're here til 5! 3:30 pm, we left and it was a fun adventure, albeit the youngest fell on his @$$ 5 times and the other twice. I slipped badly twice but I regained my footing before actually hitting the ground, thankfully.  We got to the store and got busy finding her crack, blueberries to make a recipe - and fresh flour and vanilla extract - saltines and a few other things. 

I made the kids bring their backpacks.  WAYYYY easier to pack that stuff home on their backs than attempting to carry stuff by hand.  

The dog was weird, he wanted out a lot.  I let him out and made him stay out for a while.  It's cold, you wanna be out there? Fine but it's not a couple of minutes.   \

The other eventful thing today is the fact that I wasn't trying to drive my vehicle out of the neighborhood. The road was literally ice.  What's the point? We have food, we just went to the store on a whim to mix things up.  The point? After that walk to the store, I contacted dispatch and informed them I was NOT going to be driving tomorrow. I didn't care what their response was going to be if it was going to negative or trying to pressure me, they can piss off if they tried that and I would have told them so directly.

But, they aren't like that thankfully. Another battle I didn't have to fight, after I sent that, I got a reply back that drivers down south aren't  going anywhere and that the dispatcher was supposed to have called you to cancel that load.  

I'm telling you right now on this blog, I would not have taken that load regardless.  

There were numerous accidents and probably more I don't know about including several involving semis.  One had a pic of the truck hanging halfway off a bridge some 20 miles from here. I recognized the bridge immediately, it's just north of Jerfferson.  

But the problem doesn't stop with tonight. The forecast is for a HIGH of 31 degrees and then back down to 15  that night. MORE ICING CONDITIONS.

I'm done. It's getting late. I don't have to get up early but I am sleepy.