I lived through and survived my first snowstorm! I just wished it wasn’t my busy season so I could have enjoyed it a little more without feeling guilty for not working as much as I “should” have been.
Monday started out as a normal, winter day. Everyone at my office talked about the snowstorm that was expected to hit the following day, half laughing about it, half wondering if it would really hit. I pretty much had resolved that I would come in to the office Tuesday morning but would leave as soon as the first snow flurry fell, if it did. When I left work later that day, I had a terrible headache which put me in bed at a very early hour (for me) of 8:30pm.
Tuesday morning, when my alarm went off at 6am, my headache still remained, so I decided to stay home to try to get rid of it. Around noon, I was feeling better, so I started working from home just as the snow began to fall. There have been a couple instances of snow flurries in Atlanta since I’ve lived here that would melt as soon as they hit a surface, but this was not like that. Once they snow began to fall, it didn’t stop for several hours and actually stuck! I finally convinced Chris to come home from work early so that he wouldn’t be driving home in terrible conditions and thank goodness he did. His normal 6 mile/20 minute drive home took him an hour and a half! And that was just the beginning.
(I was not ready to go out in the cold, so excuse the poor quality of photos taken from my phone through the windows!)
Apparently the entire city of Atlanta decided early Tuesday afternoon that they needed to head home and that’s when mayhem hit. Interstate 75 north quickly become a parking lot as everyone working in downtown left the city to go home and pick up their kids from school. Roads quickly became covered with snow and ice and any hills became impossible to climb.
Once Chris came home, we took the dogs out in our family’s first snow. Shelby chowed down on the snow while Magnum frolicked around in delight. We tried taking them on our normal walk around the neighborhood and although all bundled up, Shelby only made it about half way before she planted her butt on the ground and refused to budge. Chris carried her the rest of the way (she’s a little spoiled princess most of the time, but I felt so bad thinking she might be super cold)!
Around 9pm, we found out a friend of ours was stranded at a bus station in midtown. The bridges going across the connector in to midtown were iced over and no buses could get to the station. Chris told him to walk across the bridge and then he could pick him up and take him home. Chris took my car and left the house around 9:30, got about 2 miles away and realized he could go no further. All the roads around our area were either blocked with abandoned cars, closed down due to ice, or were almost as bad as I-75 with traffic. Our friend ended up walking the 5 miles home faster than Chris could get out of the neighborhood. After about 2.5 hours, Chris had to park the car in a parking lot and walk the last mile home, which took him another half hour or so. The total snowfall on Tuesday was about 2.5 inches.
Wednesday ended up being another “snow day” as news reports, weather stations, and our offices urged everyone to not leave where they were unless it was an emergency. Even though Chris and I ended up just having to work from home, I tried to make the most of the day by making snow day pumpkin pancakes.
They may not look pretty, but they sure are yummy!
Later that afternoon, after the sun had been out for a couple hours melting the snow, Chris and I bundled up to brave the cold and walked the mile to my car and hoped it wasn’t damaged and that we’d be able to get it home. We passed numerous abandoned cars parked in the middle of the street because they could go no further. There was even a car that slide in to another because it lost control and slide across the ice until it hit the car and the curb. I grew very nervous and prepared myself for the worst. Luckily, my car was unscathed and we were able to get it out of the parking lot, up the hill, and into our neighborhood without difficulty. This little 2 mile journey took us almost an hour and a half to complete.
Thursday, I woke up to an email from my immediate supervisor urging no one to leave their house and to continue to work from home because the road conditions were still so bad. Being a Florida native, never having lived through a snowstorm or even having to drive on ice covered roads, I did not argue with her, knowing I was not prepared to even attempt to drive in these conditions. Chris was a different story and he waited a couple hours for the sun to continue to melt the snow and ice and then made his way to his office. Much to my surprise, the roads weren’t quite so bad and he was able to make it without any problems.
Stories began to come through of people having to abandon their cars and walk home in the cold or even worse, had to sleep and stay in their cars for 12, 15, even 20 hours in the below freezing temperatures before they were able to get moving again! I heard another story of a bus driver with a bus of mentally handicapped children getting stranded through the night with just a few bottles of water and snacks for her and the children. I quickly realized Chris and I had it pretty easy. We were both able to get to our warm home safe and sound. Stories also came out about people lending a hand and helping those in need. Some simply poured kitty litter in the streets to help stuck cars get going, others offered hot beverages, food, and blankets to people walking home. People even went so far as to open their homes to complete strangers who couldn’t get to their own homes! I love hearing stories like these of people coming together in times of need and they really restore my faith in humanity.
Friday, I re-joined society and decided to finally go back to work (in my downtown office, not upstairs in my house). I heard even more stories from my colleagues of their snowstorm experiences. A partner in my office had a client meeting north of the city at 2pm on Tuesday and couldn’t get home after, so he had to sleep in his car in a gas station parking lot. Another colleague drove as far north as he could before having to abandon his car in the street and walk the last 7 miles home. Although the roads in our neighborhood were mostly clear, our driveway and yard was still blanketed in snow and the worst part of my drive was trying to pull in to my driveway to park in the garage. My tires began to slide as I pulled onto the driveway and I quickly reversed, parked in the street, and asked Chris to move my car in the garage for me.
Today, the snow has completely melted from our yard and driveway and we actually enjoyed some mild temperatures in the mid-50s. Who would have ever thought I’d be excited for 50 degree weather?!
And that’s how I survived snowmageddon 2014!
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