First things first, the Minnesota Twins have played their last game in the Metrodome tonight. They lost three straight to the New York Yankees and they are into a new outdoor stadium next year. Got to watch them excavate home plate so they can move it to the new stadium. Although the Twins won two world series in the Metrodome it was not a great stadium to watch a ballgame and it will be refreshing to visit the Cities to see outdoor baseball in 2010.
I woke up to eight inches of snow in my room at the Hilton Garden Inn in Casper, WY. today. Actually, the snow wasn't in my room but outside. I did wake in my room though. It is October 11 everyone...October 11! The snow scrapers were sold out at the convenience store so I used a copy of the Cheyenne Sunday paper to remove the snow from my car. I chose to go barehanded in my snow removal since I couldn't find my gloves. Ah, that feeling of numb hands in the near dark removing snow from the hood and windshield, can't beat it in the morning. Got coffee and a donut and hit the road.
Driving in the blowing snow on packed ice and road snow is an art and not so much of a privilege. It was stressful for about 2 hours before I stopped for breakfast. The snow was swirling on the road and around my car like an art piece and when trucks passed they swirled up enough of the stuff leaving me in a white out world for what seemed like hours at a time. Knowing there were cars in front of me without being able to see them while going 60 mph left me thinking of the times that I had to drive from St.Paul to Ames, IA, where I went to college, in the winter.
I got to remember my trip through Sheffield, Iowa when I was a senior, as I was dodging snow ruts in Wyoming. Then, in 1981, I had a 1972 Plymouth Sattelite with rusty fenders and a hood that eventually came off while I was driving. While I still had my hood though I was driving with another student that I didn't know very well, a commuter from the Twin Cities like myself. She shared in gas money. We were caught in a blizzard in December with trucks jackknifed in the ditch and every mile being a white knuckle experience. We had to get off the road in northern Iowa or die. It happened that Sheffield was close, a community of three bars and a gas station. It was mid-day and we limped into one of the bars. It had some heavyweights in it at noon and the TVs had rodeo going, as it turned out, all day. I was too nervous to drink and my friend was freaking out. We had to stay in the bar until the evening, talking and watching rodeo. By evening we were both exhausted without prospects for sleeping, the blizzard continued to rage. So I asked the owner if we could plan to stay in the bar until morning. He was concise in his answer, "F--- no". There seemed no chance for negotiations, so I asked a woman at the end of the bar if she knew where we could stay. She said we could stay in her apartment above the bar and showed us the way up the wooden stairs on the side of the building. It was ef'en cold. My friend got a two seater couch and I got a kitchen chair. Our host went back to the bar to return later. While she was getting ready to go to bed a friendly male patron of the bar came up the stairs...clomp...clomp...clomp...stamp, stamp (to get snow off his boots, polite guy). He wanted to know if she was OK. She was, and they went to her bedroom, just ten feet from where I was sitting upright in my kitchen chair pretending to sleep. She said that she didn't do this much but she lives above a bar and has two complete strangers in her small apartment. I think she may do it much but I was young and foolish, and I wasn't casting dispersions, just questioning her. They were active in there, and verbal, and her bed squeaked. I felt like I had appendicitis and didn't sleep a wink. When the sun came up, and the storm abated, my friend and I left without poking our head in her bedroom to say goodbye. I think we left some money since was strangely kind to help us, but MY GOD! We hit the road that was littered with car and truck carnage.
I got to relive this experience driving today in the blowing snow through Western Wyoming. I vowed not to stop.
Now I'm comfortable in Denver after spending time with my friend Tim and his daughter Peggy who tonight announced that she was changing her name to Meg.
This has been the travel portion of the expedition, tomorrow I start in Asthma Clinic at National Jewish. 1400 miles in three wonder packed days and it was great fun.
I woke up to eight inches of snow in my room at the Hilton Garden Inn in Casper, WY. today. Actually, the snow wasn't in my room but outside. I did wake in my room though. It is October 11 everyone...October 11! The snow scrapers were sold out at the convenience store so I used a copy of the Cheyenne Sunday paper to remove the snow from my car. I chose to go barehanded in my snow removal since I couldn't find my gloves. Ah, that feeling of numb hands in the near dark removing snow from the hood and windshield, can't beat it in the morning. Got coffee and a donut and hit the road.
Driving in the blowing snow on packed ice and road snow is an art and not so much of a privilege. It was stressful for about 2 hours before I stopped for breakfast. The snow was swirling on the road and around my car like an art piece and when trucks passed they swirled up enough of the stuff leaving me in a white out world for what seemed like hours at a time. Knowing there were cars in front of me without being able to see them while going 60 mph left me thinking of the times that I had to drive from St.Paul to Ames, IA, where I went to college, in the winter.
I got to remember my trip through Sheffield, Iowa when I was a senior, as I was dodging snow ruts in Wyoming. Then, in 1981, I had a 1972 Plymouth Sattelite with rusty fenders and a hood that eventually came off while I was driving. While I still had my hood though I was driving with another student that I didn't know very well, a commuter from the Twin Cities like myself. She shared in gas money. We were caught in a blizzard in December with trucks jackknifed in the ditch and every mile being a white knuckle experience. We had to get off the road in northern Iowa or die. It happened that Sheffield was close, a community of three bars and a gas station. It was mid-day and we limped into one of the bars. It had some heavyweights in it at noon and the TVs had rodeo going, as it turned out, all day. I was too nervous to drink and my friend was freaking out. We had to stay in the bar until the evening, talking and watching rodeo. By evening we were both exhausted without prospects for sleeping, the blizzard continued to rage. So I asked the owner if we could plan to stay in the bar until morning. He was concise in his answer, "F--- no". There seemed no chance for negotiations, so I asked a woman at the end of the bar if she knew where we could stay. She said we could stay in her apartment above the bar and showed us the way up the wooden stairs on the side of the building. It was ef'en cold. My friend got a two seater couch and I got a kitchen chair. Our host went back to the bar to return later. While she was getting ready to go to bed a friendly male patron of the bar came up the stairs...clomp...clomp...clomp...stamp, stamp (to get snow off his boots, polite guy). He wanted to know if she was OK. She was, and they went to her bedroom, just ten feet from where I was sitting upright in my kitchen chair pretending to sleep. She said that she didn't do this much but she lives above a bar and has two complete strangers in her small apartment. I think she may do it much but I was young and foolish, and I wasn't casting dispersions, just questioning her. They were active in there, and verbal, and her bed squeaked. I felt like I had appendicitis and didn't sleep a wink. When the sun came up, and the storm abated, my friend and I left without poking our head in her bedroom to say goodbye. I think we left some money since was strangely kind to help us, but MY GOD! We hit the road that was littered with car and truck carnage.
I got to relive this experience driving today in the blowing snow through Western Wyoming. I vowed not to stop.
Now I'm comfortable in Denver after spending time with my friend Tim and his daughter Peggy who tonight announced that she was changing her name to Meg.
This has been the travel portion of the expedition, tomorrow I start in Asthma Clinic at National Jewish. 1400 miles in three wonder packed days and it was great fun.
How can you be too nervous to drink? Isn't that a little like being too drunk to fish?
ReplyDeleteEveryone should have a small town bar story like that. Those are the people and places that really make life interesting.
Hope you made your way to work in that foot of Denver snow this morning!