January 2007 Ice Storm
Originally uploaded by force_majeure_quilts.

Here’s a belated post on the ice storm. I made it home from St. Louis the night it started. All flights were canceled, but two other desperate travelers and I managed to get a shuttle ride back through the freeze line. Dean, from Bee-Line Express, drove three hours to St. Louis to pick us up, and then spent another five hours getting us all to our destinations.

When I picked up my car at the local airport, it was covered in ice and there as half a foot of snow drifted around it. Lucky for me, I drive a trusty Honda with a traction control system, as well as the very-expensive-but-well-worth-it Goodyear three season tires that were a gift from my husband several years ago. I can take that car through almost anything on the road that a 4-wheel drive can take. (I don’t off-road in my Honda on purpose.)

I had to stop twice to clear the ice off my windshield, and the last mile on gravel road with no lights was an adventure in disorientation. But I made it home…..and woke up the next day to a half-inch of ice over everything. If I hadn’t gotten home that night, it would have been three days before I could have gotten home.

Just getting out to the barn to feed the animals became dangerous. Several farmers in our church are sporting splints, another friend fell and fractured her arm trying to get up a driveway to deliver mail, and one neighbor fell and knocked himself out on the ice. He came to on his own, having no idea how long he laid there. When the studmuffin heads out into the barn, I note the time to make sure the same doesn’t happen to him.

After a short hop last week into the low forties, the temperature has now plunged into the teens again. With wind chills, this morning’s temp was -20. The ice is still here, but slowly evaporating into the very dry air.

Hey, it keeps the riff-raff out….