From time to time you may find yourself piloting a motor vehicle on a road surface covered, fully or partially, in snow.
Nope, and certainly not if I can help it.
I miss living someplace where it snows.
Being a helpful person, I once pushed a guy's car so he could get moving in a snowy parking lot. Being a friendly person, he stopped to thank me. So I had to push the asshole's car out of the snow again.
Clearly heartfelt, but not always possible to follow. P'burgh, for instance has a lot of busy roads on top of narrow interfluves which results in unfortunate but necessary steep uphill stoppages when apporaching via sideroads. Fortunately, we generally do not get a buttload of snow.
narrow interfluves
I like this one.
4: I'm more afraid of the busy road at the bottom of the fucking hill.
People still live in Pittsburgh? Weird.
People live here, but they don't actually clear the streets of snow anymore.
So I had to push the asshole's car out of the snow again.
Fortunately, we generally do not get a buttload of snow.
Pittsburghers keep their snow and cars up their butts.
9.1: It was in the parking lot of the law school at Ohio State.
6: Yeah, there generally is a quasi-parallel busy road is at the bottom of the corresponding narrow valley.
Stormcrow, how's the new Iphone working for you?
12: Actually, I'm just fucked in the head a tad bit more than usual today. But you knew that.
My Chicago-born friend in your fair city was likewise griping this morning about the inability of Southern drivers to cope with snow. (Though, to be fair, people around here drive like idiots, too!)
Well, I'm the last one with the right to be a little bitch about typos.
10: So Ohio State keeps its law school in Pittsburgh?
re: 4
I fucked up my clutch not long ago in that situation. Absurdly steep hill [one of the steepest I've ever driven up] upon which one had to stop, right at the steepest part as it merged with a larger road. Steep enough that I had to have the revs up high with the clutch at the biting point just to hold it. Steep enough that with the hand brake on I still had to have my foot on the foot brake to stop the car rolling backwards. Fucking road designers.*
* actually a road that probably existed for several hundreds years before the invention of the internal combustion engine, but still, it should have had lights.
Don't they sell chains out where you guys are? If everything is covered in snow and you're going to be going up or down hills that you can't start on even with winter tires, they might be a good idea even if you don't need to stop.
We have this conversation every winter!
We've had all of -- maybe -- 2 inches of snow today. My housemate phoned late this afternoon to say that he was just near {place} and if he couldn't make it home, could I come and get him?
Okay, but really? You're 5 minutes from home! I could hit you with a rock! Drive very very slowly and don't stop if at all possible, don't brake in anything but the most gentle way, and of course I'll be on call. I said.
Five minutes later he pulled into the driveway.
Now, admittedly, apparently he'd passed an overturned car 20 minutes previously, and had made it down a mild hill only by sliding slowly sideways, so he was freaked out. I understand that. In this case, that car sucks in the snow, as I know perfectly well, having been, shall we say, disarranged in it more than once back when it was my car.
I think the lesson is: don't drive cars with horrible traction in the snow.
as I know perfectly well, having been, shall we say, disarranged in it more than once back when it was my car
This can be read more than one way.
I fucked up my clutch not long ago in that situation. Absurdly steep hill [one of the steepest I've ever driven up] upon which one had to stop, right at the steepest part as it merged with a larger road. Steep enough that I had to have the revs up high with the clutch at the biting point just to hold it. Steep enough that with the hand brake on I still had to have my foot on the foot brake to stop the car rolling backwards. Fucking road designers.*mans
While I didn't ruin anything I had some real fun on side streets in the Hollywood hills with extreme steepness and cross-streetiness.
21: So I see. But it's a pickup truck with zero traction, and that was my way of saying that I rear-ended someone in the snow several years ago with it, to my deep chagrin. I wasn't my fault! I couldn't stop!
I see the low-hanging fruit continues. But I'm glad it's not my car any more.
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And now Amazon, apparently, is weighing in on incest.
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But it's a pickup truck with zero traction...
Probably need more weight in the rear.
Chains for the tires sounds like a good idea, but I never see a car with them. I don't want to be like the kid who wears a helmet when he plays soccer. So much like Parsimon, I can't stop rear-ending people.
Plainly, front-end-heavy vehicles -- with front-wheel drive! -- are completely absurd. I have no idea what anybody is thinking; in the absence of balance and core body strength, you're just going to be skittering around helplessly.
It's okay parsi, though a bit more "country" thank I pictured you. Bench or bucket seat?
28: I never thought I'd own that car either. Chevy S-10 pickup, extended cab, I think it's called, meaning like half a seat's width behind the driver/passenger seats, which gradually filled with magazines and pillows and .. fabrics, and oars. I bought it jointly with my ex because it met his hauling needs, and when we split up, he couldn't afford to buy me out, so I found myself owning a pickup truck.
31: Sounds like you misunderstood what it means to be a pickup artist. But, hey, sweet truck. When it's not snowing.
But, hey, sweet truck
It was fine. I respect that little truck. Except that it has no business pretending to anything in the snow, or even mud.
My folks used to have one of those. Ther was one offroad adventure I thought it couldn't handle due to it's low clearance-standing water on the way to a lake for fishing. It worked out, but barely. OTOH, I once parked off the side of a driveway at a friends house before a heavy rain. When I went to head home I was mired in the mud--front wheel drive strikes again.
I had a Dodge Ram 50 with the same problem. After I traded it in, I saw it one day in the parking lot of the movie theater. The new owner had half the cab filled with cigarette butts. Asshole.
Even when I smoked, I'd throw the butts out the window.
36: Yeah, thanks for that. Asshole.
As long as we're griping, I would argue that fully iced sidewalks are safer than salty, wet sidewalks with occasional invisible ice patches. Not that I don't enjoy breaking into an involuntary c-walk every fifty yards.
You're my neighbor who likes to watch me grab the phone pole before I slide into the street.
I once parked off the side of a driveway at a friends house before a heavy rain. When I went to head home I was mired in the mud--front wheel drive strikes again.
Yeah. I wound up digging a one-foot-deep trench to one side of the driveway a couple of years ago in similar circumstances. My across the street neighbor, 70 years old, heroically helped me out eventually with a combination of plywood and flattened cardboard boxes, with me all the while protesting [don't have a heart attack! I can go in to work late! This is ridiculous!]
Silly truck.
My across the street neighbor, 70 years old, heroically helped me out
Our elderly neighbor who heroically shoveled snow last year (with colostomy bag and all!) passed away in the ensuing year. It was sad to think about today as it was snowing.
Also: in the ensuing year, we've also added a roommate who's from New England, which is nice because now I'm not the only one in the house who knows how to pick up a fucking snow shovel. (In fairness: he does root for the Pats, so there are drawbacks.)
27: Plainly, front-end-heavy vehicles -- with front-wheel drive! -- are completely absurd.
Hmm, have you ever driven an unloaded pickup truck on snow and ice?
Once, my one neighbor knocked on the door asking if I'd go shovel the walk for another neighbor I didn't know. So, I did his shoveling and he was telling me how he hadn't seen so much snow since he was in Belgium (this was in North Carolina). "When," I asked, "were you in Belgium?" "Battle of the Bulge" was the reply.
I'm not the only one in the house who knows how to pick up a fucking snow shovel.
Yeah, most people don't realize it works best if you start with a neg.
I was going to say, "Nuts" and go back inside. Instead I made a mental note to just go over there the next time it snowed that much. And it never snowed that much again.
41.1: Oh, that is sad.
One of my favorite neighbors -- the guy who had the amazing garden, diagonally across and up the street -- passed away two years ago, and I can't say the new owners have any idea what to do with his gorgeous raised garden beds, which just languish there.
24: Forget it, x.trapnel. It's Chinatown Amazon.com.
The canonical driving-on-snowy-hill video. In the defense of the people in the video, icy conditions came on suddenly that day, as sometimes happens here, and that's a steeper hill than it looks like from that angle. That said, Portland drivers, taken together, are for myriad reasons the worst I've ever shared the road with, so if there's snow on the ground it's prudent to stay clear.
Couple of minutes walk from my house, on the way down to the park and playground, was a house that always had a big tub of water outside for any passing animals, and the front window & door were decorated with pictures of cats and Reading FC stuff. Sometimes the old woman who lived there would be out in the front garden and I would have a quick chat about her cat, or my dog. But a few weeks ago the tub of water disappeared and now the house clearly has builders in and everything is being cleaned and replaced. I'm telling myself she's in a nice friendly care home with her car.
Ontario had a bunch of motorists who had to stop in the middle of the road, because the drifts had buried them. That would be kind of disconcerting.
People still live in Pittsburgh?
depends what you're prepared to call "living".
52: We're in a country that includes Texas. You'd be surprised what we're prepared to call "living".
48: A video about despair: those people aren't even trying any more--it's like they're just along for the ride while their cars destroy each other.
The first time I lived in the northeast, I remember wondering why people seemed to keep dull plastic blades in their cars. Then, after winter came, I remember wondering why it was that people lived in the northeast.
I miss living someplace where it snows.
Did Sifu & Blume move to Standpipe's blog or am I missing something?
56: I took him to be complaining (maybe faux-complaining?) that his area's gotten relatively less snow in recent times. But it's possible they moved to Tahiti.
56: you're not the one who's missing something.
We got shit for snow last year, too. All those articles about the East Coast being inundated by record-breaking storms? ALL LIES.
48: It's like they've never heard of first gear.
Maybe I could import some New Englanders for some recreational snow shoveling. It'd be like that Fresh Air thing mentioned on the hunger thread, only colder.
It's like they've never heard of first gear.
First gear: it's alright.
I remember wondering why it was that people lived in the northeast
Less likely to crack off and slide into the ocean.
No more masturbating to Captain Beefheart. Today is teh sad.
Yearly service posting. Probability of 1" snow on the ground on Christmas. Not too late to plan accordingly.
I remember wondering why it was that people lived in the northeast
Not so much with the water shortage thing and the wildfires.
64, 68 -- Just keep telling that to yourselves, guys.
I like the twin implications in 70 that 1. wildfires, earthquakes and drought are in fact endemic to the northeast and 2. apo and parsimon live here.
61: Actually, first gear wouldn't have helped. Not driving at all would have helped.
Well, look, the only other answer to Halford's poking would be to post gorgeous pictures of the Northeast in fall and winter, but those can be had aplenty online, and Halford's a wuss who can't stand to shovel a bit of snow even if he does eat nothing but meat, which probably makes him smell funny.
ven if he does eat nothing but meat, which probably makes him smell funny
I love this.
I feel badly, since Halford might be sniffing his underarms even as we speak.
I'm feeling bad since all you privileged, SWPL, twee bastards are seconding Parsi's new aggro streak, but I'd probably feel worse if the ground were covered with disgusting slush. Also, slush and cold weather has caused me pain -- deep, personal, soul-destroying pain -- whereas I've actually never been affected in any very tangible way by a fire, drought, or earthquake. I guess it has smelled a bit bad in August some years, and a glass swan on my parents' mantle broke in the Northridge quake. Oh noes.
As for my smell, it is all man, baby. All caveman.
Creepily, my family gave me a glass swan years and years ago, which I didn't care for much. My mom shipped it to me a few years ago for some reason, and it arrived broken. I of course did not tell her that.
I actually had a glass swam made in front of my eyes for me as a party favor of sorts by a master glassblower--those of you who listed to WCRB in the Boston area 20 years ago may remember the ads for his glass harmonicas, though his business was built around scientific instruments--at a going-away party for a Belgian speedskater, a member of our skating club, who'd been the glassblower's apprentice while in the USA.
Anyway. I don't know about yours, but my swan was and remains awesome.
Though I have to say, as much as I'm charmed by Aggro!Parsi, Halford's totally right about winter weather. The ground here is, in fact, covered with disgusting slush at the moment--well, okay, mostly just snow, but riding my bike involves navigating a lot of slush--and it sucks. Boo. Boooo.
Why the hell didn't I decide to learn a language spoken in warm places? Sigh.
You speak English, motherfucker!
(Actually, it's freezing and rainy here today, so probably not the best time for me to be pursuing this particular argument).
Aggro!Parsi
I actually don't like this. My 73 was intended to be completely good-natured.
I think we all took it as such, and were intending the sassy/aggro Parsimon remarks good-naturedly, as well. Comity!
Okay. I strive to be non-threatening, you know. (insert emoticon here)
85: d00d, Weather Underground says it's 55 degrees there.
I'm now imagining a film about Halford in which he spends much of the time lying on a fainting couch holding the back of his hand to his forehead. In one scene, he looks balefully out the window at the parched vegetation and takes a sip of water as a barely perceptible wisp of smoke drifts by; in another, there is an earthquake, and as we see a hillside crumble in the distance, a little glass unicorn will tip over on a shelf and break its horn with a tiny snap. This will be the loudest sound in the film. The working title is "Big Girl's Blouse".
Wasn't RH's northeastern experience in NYC? You almost never have daytime temps dropping below twenty around here, in other words it never gets uncomfortably cold unless you insist on dressing as if it were fifty. And snow, gorgeous. That first nippy autumn day with that dying leaf smell, so nice. But at least I get coastal California - spring and summer all year round isn't bad. But the South and the rest of the Southwest... are people insane? Horrible weather for half the year and no proper winter?
But the South and the rest of the Southwest... are people insane? Horrible weather for half the year and no proper winter?
I can get on board with this.
Wait, RH is counting NYC as New England?
We're as close as you can get to New England without being in it, which makes the weather pretty similar.
93: Oh. Noted. Alright, then. Those parts of the northeast that aren't New England can be a little drab.
Yes, the barren wastelands of the Hudson River Valley are really quite soul-deadening.
Totally. It's practically the same as NYC.
(Tweety, you do get that there's kidding going on, right?)
We're as close as you can get to New England without being in it, which makes the weather pretty similar.
It took me a long time to finally realize that New York is not considered part of New England. It's so close geographically, and it carries one of those New in front of an Old English placenames.
98: I guess it doesn't count if the Dutch used to own it.
