The winter storm that has blanketed the Midwest with large amounts of snowfall has also extended itself to Tennessee. What does this mean....it means that you're throwing weather into a city that isn't accustomed to it. In the end, it basically means panic. It also means that rush hour is going to be an absolute nightmare.
Our forecast was rain, that will turn into freezing rain/sleet that would taper off my noon followed by snow flurries until 3:00. Little to no accumulation was expected. Either way, the roads were still going to be a mess and drivers were only going to act more crazy. You know it's bad when the weatherman tells people that they need to back off the car in front of them to allow more space in between cars. Duh! Who doesn't know this already! But down here....extra space between cars just means that another car can squeeze in.
I decided that there was no way I was going to mess with this! So, I jumped onto the Regional Transit Authority bus. I boarded at 6:05 AM sat back, relaxed, and watched TV while I let someone else do the driving. This was like no other public transportation bus I had ever been on before. I honestly felt like I was on an airplane taxiing down the road. This was a NICE bus! I can't say that this is something that I would want to do everyday (the fare was $7 round trip), but nice to know that it is available. Two of the bus's stops are even at Vanderbilt, one right outside of my building. Thank goodness...because I can't imagine what would have happened if I needed to change buses at the station onto Metro Transit Authority (and trust me...they are your typical public transportation buses). I'm proud of myself though for attempting the use of public transportation by bus in a major city for the first time in my life.
In the end, driving myself wouldn't have been bad. All of the schools were cancelled, which means less people on the road. The sleet started about 7:15 and turned to snow around 8:00 in downtown. I would say it was done by 10:00.
Justin's in Indianapolis this week for training at headquarters and has had the experience of enjoying the Indiana weather all over again. He is already over it and ready to come back to TN. (Hopefully he can get through KY!) For those of you back home, he feels your pain! He woke up yesterday to 9" of snow on his Trailblazer! I don't think he has a scraper in his car either! We pulled them out of the vehicles since we don't need them down here. I had to hunt for one yesterday morning since I knew my car would be sitting outside all day.
So if you are shoveling your driveways/sidewalks, scraping your windshields, putting on the long johns and layering your clothing....here's what our end of the storm amounted to:
I'll be so glad when our warmer weather starts to return. That day of 60' weather was a nice little tease. As for now I'm trying to get lots of rest as I have an upper respiratory infection. I need to get better fast....I'm off to New Orleans next week!
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