Manic Monday, wherein manic = horrific.

Sometimes the universe likes to deliver a wee lesson re: overconfidence. Such was the case yesterday, or, as I shall forever remember it, The Day From Hell That I Should Have Seen Coming.

All weekend I had been planning my Monday, knowing that there were a number of things I needed to accomplish by the end of that day:

1. A doctor's appointment @ 9:20 am at a location roughly 20 miles west and south of me. (A routine check on a well-controlled chronic condition; no biggie.)
   
2. Deliver the doctor's prescription to a pharmacy another 25 miles farther west and south.
   
3. Refill several other prescriptions at that pharmacy.
4. Continue driving west and south on that road for another 25 or so miles, all the way to our house in south Minneapolis to pick up some stuff.
5. Continue on to Edina (a first-ring suburb on the southern edge of Minneapolis, for those of you Not Of Our Area) in order to return a new cell phone and cancel its tragically expensive contract.
6. Mail our holiday letters. Yes, I am fully aware that it was January 12. What's your point?
   
7. Return to Polk County by 4 pm to attend the monthly meeting of Friends of the Polk County Libraries.
8. Go to my book group at 6:30 pm.
9. Finish reading Reservation Blues during any downtime; it was my choice for my reading group's January book so it would be my responsibility to lead the discussion. I had read the book several years ago but needed to finish re-reading it in order that I might not make a complete hash of the discussion and an ass of myself.
   

If it were any time in the year between, say, April and October, this list would not present any great problems. It is, however, mid-winter, and that season can screw up the best-laid plans of any man or Kat™ without breaking a sweat.

Had I had the foresight -- and common sense -- to check the radar map and weather forecast before I left, none of the following would have happened.

I accomplished numbers one through three, above, no problem, and even managed to sneak in a tasty breakfast (a Western omelet with a side of whole wheat toast and lots of coffee, thanks for asking) in Lindström. My journey continued on down the highway in a southern and westerly direction toward the Twin Cities.

At some point it began snowing. Heavily. There had been a few random flakes floating down from the heavens when I left home, but I thought they were being dislodged from the trees by a gentle breeze. Duh. They were in fact the first harbingers of a short but nasty winter storm. The visibility dropped, although not dangerously so, and snow began to accumulate between the lanes and at the edge of the road. Traffic slowed a bit, but not a great deal. The speed limit on I-35 and I-35W is 70 mph, and traffic, including me, was moving at 55 to 60. The pavement appeared dry, with skiffs of snow blowing across it. It did NOT appear slippery.

So I was driving merrily along with traffic, passing no one and other cars occasionally passing me, when my car started to fishtail slightly. I missed my tiny window of opportunity to regain control, and the fishtailing accelerated -- although of course I did not -- until I found myself skidding broadside down I-35W at nearly 60 mph and realizing that my car had totally lost it and I wasn't coming out of this easily.

The front wheels caught the edge of the road, the car spun, and for several seconds all I could see outside my windows was dense flying snow. I held my breath and waited to be struck by another car. When my car came to rest, here is where I found myself:

Another view:

 

Imagine with me, if you will, the consequences if I had spun out in front of, oh,  I don't know, say, THAT SEMI! The least of which would be that you would not be able to read this blog post because I WOULD BE DEAD!

Ahem. Enough with the dramatics already. Suffice to say, the worst did not happen and I (and my car) were intact.

I pulled out my archaic-but-trusty cell phone (with just enough charge for one call because I had forgotten to recharge it) and found that I was in an Emergency Service Only location. Blessed 911 called a tow truck for me.

Behold, my savior:

 

 

(Why, yes, I did stand in the deep snow and take photos of the whole damned thing. I do it for The Blog.)

The tow truck driver had me sit in the driver's seat and keep the wheels pointing more-or-less straight ahead during the pull-out until he signaled me to turn them.

 

That is an approximately 20-minute buildup of snow on the passenger's window. It was snowing really, really hard.

My car popped out of the ditch, and, $133 later, I was safely on my way again. Driving, need I say it, very, very carefully.

As to my overly-ambitious list of Things To Do On Monday, I made it through number four by 2 pm, at which point I realized there was no way I could make it back to Polk County for numbers seven and eight. I made some phone calls to cancel my presence at Friends and the book group and managed to finish the rest of my Twin Cities errands by 3:30, at which time I decided to brave the beginning of a winter storm rush hour and to attempt to get back to my cozy home next to the frozen lake in Wisconsin.

A note for the easily apprehensive-d among you: no further sliding nor crashing were experienced. Relax and ride along.

Traffic was not too bad until I got past downtown Minneapolis and onto That [New] Bridge. Suddenly everybody was moving so slowly that my speed didn't even register on the speedometer. It continued that way until well past I-694, the loop of I-94 that transcribes the northern edges of the Twin Cities, which I reached... 45 minutes later. That distance would normally be less than a 10 minute drive.

Now, being stuck in traffic is not typically something that would bother me as long as I had my iPod with an audio book for entertainment. Which I did (Across the Nightingale Floor; once again, thanks for asking). But my Aveo has a standard transmission, which meant my still-tender left foot and ankle were dealing with the clutch for 45 minutes straight. That became painful after about 45 seconds and did not get any better during the remaining 44 minutes and 15 seconds. Even after the traffic unwound itself to move at 35 mph and I no longer needed to keep my sore foot on the clutch, waves of achy pain continued to roll over it.

I got home about 8:30, took a pain pill -- my first since mid-October -- and went to bed to sleep for 12.5 hours. Today is ever so much better.

Resolved: to always check the weather BEFORE setting off, no matter how benign it looks before I leave. Amen.

Comments

[sophanne]

I'm glad you're ok. I was glad for the message to relax as well. I knew there was a good reason for me to be obsessed with checking the weather every other minute whether i'm going anywhere or not. You never know.

[cursingmama]

Resolved -
Phone a friend when you find yourself stranded in traffic to stop by & visit until the roads are more hospitable. I'm fairly certain you drove (or inched) past quite a number of us on your way back to Polk County.

PS - Am glad that your spin out was (in the land of spin outs) not too exciting and did not involve any undue crunching.

[Cookie]

Holy Crap!

I'm so glad that you, the car and the ankle all made it home safely in the proper amount of pieces.

[tut-tut]

Good god! I've hydroplaned (lonely stretch of rural road) and spun out (lonely stretch of another rural road), but never never on a HIGHWAY! thank heavens you're all right.

[Suzanne V. (Yarnhog)]

Oh, lord. I spun out once--and only once--on a slippery bridge, and I will never forget the way time slowed down and I could hear my heart beating and the very calm, steady voice in my head saying, "Steer into the skid...that's it...watch that car...coming around again...don't hit the side...". It's a good thing my inner voice was calm, because my outer voice was screaming its fool head off. I'm so glad you're okay!

[k]

I was so obsessed with thinking about eating breakfast in Lindstrom that it didn't occur to me till you pointed it out that things must have turned out all right, because you were blogging about it, but could have gone wrong.....
Now I have to go into my corner and breathe funny for a minute..

[Carrie K]

Oh. My. I'm scared in the rain, much less skidding off the road in snow. Glad you're okay!

But really. I think you need to cast on The Pattern. To calm your nerves. ;)

[Carrie]

Crikes! I did that once on bare pavement and didn't even have the time to register the fact that there were all sorts of cars on the road, and surprisingly, since none of them had time to react either, no one hit me. (No one stopped to see if I was all right, either, the bastards.) I sat in that median for 20 minutes not breathing.

[Miss T]

Frightening! I'm glad you're okay.

[Chris]

Yikes! I'm very glad you're ok. Having lost control and been hit by a semi - not something you want to go through.

Actually, your travel time wasn't that bad. It took me an hour to get home yesterday - I work at 169 & 394. I took 55 & Glenwood to Lyndale to 26th - my usual route, which takes 15 min max. It took me 30 minutes to get from Glenwood to my place. What's that, 2 miles?!

[limedragon :-: Harriet]

Definitely looks like a tough day, but glad you're OK. : )

[joan]

I may not leave my house again until June.
Glad you're ok and were able to get out of there so quickly.

[Helen]

Ahh... the memories of black ice coming down after an overpass.... with a trailer.
I almost pulled it out. Would have too, but for the trailer that REALLY wanted to be in the lead. folks who had already found the ditches said they were sure I'd flip the car.... but I didn't.

That 4 seconds took like six hours! I imagine yours was even worse... I at least had some delusion that I had some semblance of control over the truck.

SO glad you're okay, and the car is okay... Hope the ankle is pretty much okay today too.

[Big Alice]

AGGGH!

So glad you were okay and semi-free.

[Cathy-Cate]

So glad all is well..... SO glad!
And the adrenaline has worn off, almost!

Even checking the weather doesn't always help, though....the recent (Thanksgiving) weekend, when I ended up stranded in Rochester, the radar & forecast were completely fine when I left Mpls by way of 52. But light snow popped up as the sun got low, and then the temperature was at that perfect point for black ice when the light snow melted on the pavement and then froze in a thin invisible layer. Just never know.....

I was so glad I decided to stop (uncharacteristic for me, I tend to plow on) as I heard from a friend later that was in Rochester that afternoon and left before me that it took her 4 hours to get home (usually it's 1 1/4 hours or a bit more).

Winter weather is nothing to mess with, even though we're used to it!

[Carole]

I'm so glad you are okay and nothing worse happened!

[Nora]

Oh, crap. That really was a bad day. I'm glad it all turned out OK.

[Amy]

Holy cow! Glad you're OK! Monday was pretty awful.

[Julie]

I'm so glad you're okay! I think I would have asked the tow truck guy to tow me along for the rest of my errands. What? That's not an unreasonable request, is it?

[elizabeth]

Ohmygoodness. I hope you don't have to go anywhere today!

[Erika]

OMG!!!

[dale-harriet in WI]

A pretty typical MN/WI story -- believe me when I say MY relief and delight are equal to...or BIGGER...than everyone else's. I slid off the Beltline once, fortunately avoiding anyone else too, and OH YEAH you do some funny breathing when your lungs finally work again. That black ice stuff cannot be seen, prepared for, anticipated. Unless I truly CANNOT, in town I drive surface streets. The husband says that's worse, as they're not plowed or well-travelled like the Beltline. Here's how I see it: if I AM going to slide off the road, I want it to be into someone's front yard who will make me tea and pat my hand until the AAA guy comes. I figure "right lane, comfortable speed, devil take the hindmost (which is probably me)". I drive like a little old lady. I AM a little old lady. Still - very glad ...VERY glad, all ended well. (And that's what those pain pills are for, no harm in using them when needed; relieving the pain enhances the healing.)

[Diane]

Damm it this is no time for more adventures, MacGyver-ish or not. You have a stash full of silky wool that needs to be knit. Take care of yourself.

[deb]

You can always call me and I can tell you wjat the the weather is like here and if you should venture out. I saw this whole post coming honey!! So, so sorry!!!

[5elementknitr]

I'm so happy you're safe!