Slip Sliding Away

Well, that was fun. Last evening and overnight we had continuous freezing rain. Early this morning it changed to rain in town and snow where I live. Everything is covered in a very thick layer of ice. We left home at 5:50 am, giving ourselves an extra 10 minutes to get to work. The highway was pretty snowy but not bad enough to stay home. As we got closer to North Bay the snow started turning to rain and the highway became really slushy. Slush sucks, almost as much as glare ice.

When we got to Dave's work the parking lot and driveway were glare ice. He pulled in and managed to get the car turned around and pointed in the right direction without hitting anything. I crawled over into the driver's seat and waited until he got in the building before I started the not-so-controlled slide down the driveway to the street. All the way to my office I wondered what the hill leading to it was going to be like. Would my Ray of Sunshine have been there already and sanded the hill? Or would it be like a luge track, freshly shined and greased up, ready for some fun?

The road that leads to my office isn't a major street. As you pull off the main street you go uphill for a bit and then, after the crest of the hill, you go down and at the bottom of the hill there's a 90 degree turn. Our parking lot is on that corner. At the entrance is a steel gate with arms that swing open and closed. I usually arrive after the gate has been opened but sometimes have to wait for the guy with the key to arrive at 7am.

As I approached the turnoff I noticed that there was sand on the upside of the hill so I said a little thank you to the Ray of Sunshine. When I got to the crest of the hill the trail of sand disappeared and I rescinded the thank you. As I drove over the crest I saw glare ice; one of my co-worker's 4X4 truck in the ditch; my work husband's truck, with his new snowmachine in the back, stopped in the middle of the road; and at the bottom of the hill yet another co-worker's van sitting awfully close to the gate.

Fuck! I tried the brakes. That turned me sideways. I pumped the brakes. That slowed me down but I was still sliding. I didn't really care about my car, it's old and I could use a new one, but I was worried about hitting my co-worker's nice new trucks. Somehow I managed to slide to a stop, sideways in the road, just over the crest of the hill. Now I'm worried that someone else will come over the hill and hit me.

The guys came up to my car and filled me in on their adventures. The van had arrived first and slammed into the gate. The air bags deployed, his glasses were broken, and pieces of the gate were found about 500 feet away. At least he was unhurt. Next up on the "ride" was another co-worker, who was driving his Mom's car as his truck died yesterday. He came over the hill and saw the van in the gate, tried to slow down and couldn't and ended up in a deep ditch near the bottom of the hill. The roof of the car is level with the road. No serious damage, so far anyways, we'll see when they get him out. This is what my work husband found as he crested the hill. He managed to get stopped just before the steepest part of the hill. Soon after the next truck came along and when he saw the truck with the snowmachine in the middle of the road he ended up in the ditch with the back end of his truck sideways on the road, which is about the only thing that would have stopped him, well, other than the gate but it was already "open".

I stayed inside my car the whole time. Being a girl has it's advantages and I felt no shame in using them this morning. I mean, the rain would have killed my fabulous hair. It wasn't long until my knight in shining armour arrived. Ray to the rescue! The guys were all teasing me about my boyfriend arriving to save me and joking about how I was going to repay him. It was crazy on that hill. Ray had to call for backup because he couldn't get through all the vehicles to sand the hill and none of us could move anywhere.

They finally arrived with sand and shovels and got us off to the side so the grader and Ray could fix the hill. It was 8:10 by the time I finally got into the office, an hour late but all in one piece. The best part of the day is that because of the icey parking lot Mean Jean stayed home. *grin* I'm sure it had nothing to do with my phone call telling the boss how treacherous it was.

So? Did anyone else have that much fun before 8am? How was your morning?