So yea, a couple weeks ago we got some really bizarre weather here in the UK… bizarre in the way that it was totally unexpected, over a week of snow… snow that actually settled!  Was great, everything looked so cool covered in a white layer as far as the eye could see.  Then came the realisation that I had to drive on this stuff to get to work.  The first couple days were alright cause the serious snow hadn’t hit yet, that was due midweek.  However, when Wednesday rolled around I was getting rather nervous since I have no experience when it comes to driving on snow.  Luckily my house has extremely easy access to the motorway and once onto there I was safe… until I got to where I worked.

They hadn’t even gritted any of the roads!  Driving along the roads at 5mph wasn’t too bad though, but the offices were up a hill, so when I got to the bottom of the road that goes up to it and it was still covered in completely fresh snow (apart from a few tyre tracks) I decided against it and go in through the exit of the complex which is on flatter ground.  Unfortunately the gates were closed (think the gate mechanism was frozen shut).  So on I go and I come to the other end of the first road which looks a little less steep, so I go up it and it wasn’t long till my wheels were spinning freely.  A bit startled and panicky I put on the brakes and hit my hazard lights and let the 4×4 behind me past.  My GTi has too much low end power for snow driving, but remembering some advice I was given previously, I change to 2nd and very gently press the accelerator and slowly crept up the hill.

As soon as I was on the flat I was happy and proceeded to the office carpark… which was practically empty.  Anyway, I go in and start work, but there was hardly anyone around, but as time when on people started arriving.  Guess they left it a little later so it’d be safer.  However, I did hear that the original entrance to the road I was going to go up had been closed due to a crash halfway up it… it’s pretty steep, I’m glad I didn’t go that route!

The next day I left from my girlfriend’s house which is on the side of a hill, which I managed to get to the top of, unfortunately there was a crash at the bottom of the other side and traffic just was not moving.  The only time traffic was moving forward was when other drivers were getting impatient, giving up and pulling a U-turn and going another way.  Well I was sat at the top of this hill with my hand-brake on wondering what to do (remember I don’t have much drive-on-snow experience) and my car started to slide down the hill towards the car in front.  I slammed on the brakes and luckily 4 locked wheels gave enough traction to stop me.  That completely freaked me out and I decided to bottle, was so not going to risk crashing to get to work, I don’t prioritise things that way .  So I very carefully made my 3-point turn and handed back to my girlfriend’s house.  Luckily I don’t have to give up a day since I emailed a colleague to get the VPN details so I could work from home.  Of course, after the girlfriend got back from physio we went out and built a snowman it had a top hat .

One of the main reasons I took that day off was because we don’t get that kind of weather much and it hasn’t snowed that much for like a decade, so there’s no harm taking a snow day once in a few years or so?  Not much to ask  However, the next day was worse… previous days snow is now ice with new snow on top.  I can’t use the snow card again.  Was leaving from my girlfriend’s house again so was not looking forward to a repeat of the previous day… if I could get the freakin’ car away from the side of the road.  Was just wheel spinning where it was due to the camber of the road and ice.  Took a quite verbal lesson from the girlfriend on how to drive on snow (I guess they get quite a bit up north in Cali), managed to get the car into the middle of the road and drove on a bit to the main road that goes up the hill.  Man, this was a bad idea :/ loads of cars all driving up this icy road extremely slowly and half of them are wheel spinning.  This minivan in front of me got to a point where they couldn’t go forwards anymore, so I went around them, get about 10 metres further and also got to the point where I just had no traction (hill slowly increased in steepness).  At this point I was holding up traffic so I figured I’d pull over and work out a plan of action.  Unfortunately I was totally stuck against the curb now, couldn’t do anything but wheelspin and slip backwards and I didn’t want to damage my wheels.  So I called my girlfriend (was only about 300-400 yards away from her house) and she came out to help me, I so wanted to just say “Fuck it!  Work isn’t worth this…” but she encouraged me to keep trying (I wish she hadn’t…).  Anyway, she pushed against the back of my car as I slowly reversed away from the curb to the T-junction where I could turn around and I went back through the middle of town which took me over an hour, but at least I was heading downhill to safer roads and the bottom of the motorway.

All in all it took me 2:30 hours to make a 30 minute journey.  I was so tired of concentrating on driving and my ached hurt from pedal control.  Wasn’t the best experience of my life but at least I didn’t hit anything, which I think quite a few people did that morning (the road I got stuck on was closed shortly after I turned around… crash).  One of the things that annoyed me the most was when I rang up work to let them know I’d be in late, the receptionist went on to tell me how other people from the city I live in managed to make it in fine… big-fucking-whoop-de-doo, I wanted to bitch-slap her for her insolence.  Yea people made it in, but they probably lived in more accessible areas (like my house right next to the motorway… if I had stayed there that night) and they probably had more experience driving in hazardous conditions (haven’t even had my car for a year yet).  Anyway, I was glad that the worst of the snow/ice was over with (and that the weekend had arrived), hopefully the UK will just stay miserable and wet for a while… that I can deal with .

In hindsight I should have stayed at home.  With all the snow that has fallen over the last couple days I was so tempted to use it as an excuse not to go into work (which I know a lot of people (would) have done).  The motorways were fairly uncongested and moving freely which was ok, but getting into the town where I work was fairly dangerous.  All the roads were white or icy, everyone moving 10mph… and then I got to the road that leads up the hill to where I work.  One look at that and I thought “Fuck it, I’ll go around and enter through the exit of the estate, at least that’s level.”, but alas, the gates were closed.  So I found the other end of the first road which goes up the hill a little less steeper and went up there.  Wasn’t really a surprise that my Polo GTi started wheel spinning halfway up… too much low-end power.  I managed to break the wheelspin and stop myself on the hill while I figured out how to proceed (am not used to driving in such conditions), I turned on my hazard lights to let the 4×4 behind me know I was having difficulties and let him past incase I slipped backwards into him.  After that I was faced with a hill-start on ice/snow but it wasn’t that bad, just had to be really sensitive on the accelerator.  Anyway, got into work thinking “I should have stayed at home.” and if it wasn’t for the fact I’d probably slide down the hill trying to leave I would have.

So here I am at work and an unrelenting tiredness has overcome me.  There’s only decaffeinated tea left, but I’ve had 2 pro plus but it doesn’t seem to be doing anything.  Having extreme difficulty focusing on work and feeling like my eyes want to roll into the back of my head, I needed to somehow keep my mind active through lunch.  So have started playing Singularity and now blogging to keep the myself from slipping into neutral or stalling, heh.

Maybe the reason I’m so freaking tired is because I’m fighting off an illness of somekind, had a pretty bad sore throat yesterday, but has eased up today.  I think I’m gonna take an early night tonight or I’m going to be crippled for badminton tomorrow.

Well, bad to Singularity… laters,
Jargon