More winter weather adventures

​        I strongly dislike winter!
        The only good thing about winter is the cold kills the bugs.
        After this last week’s two rounds of snow and cold snap, I might put up with the bugs.
        I’m ready for spring.
      The original forecast was for two to four inches of snow during the early part of last week. That turned into nearly 20-inches of the white stuff.
    Topped off with upwards to 40 mph winds causing blowing and drifting snow and deep freeze temperatures, it was a storm that I would rather forget.
       Schools, businesses, restaurants and community activities all across the county and the state were either cancelled or closed due to the snowstorms and cold weather. There were hundreds of wrecks and vehicles in the ditches and overturned semis dotted the Interstates and highways across the state.
       It may be weeks before officials and others get it all cleaned up.
     Thankfully, our home heater continued working and we didn’t lose our electricity during last week’s storms. I know that wasn’t the case for others.
      Thanks to the many volunteer firemen, ambulance drivers, police and sheriff deputies, other emergency personal, electrical linemen, county road’s department employees, home repairmen, good old boys driving snowplows and so many others who stayed the course to keep us all safe.
      I missed three days of work due to the winter storms. If I can’t get there safely, I’m staying home. I didn’t have much of a choice. I couldn’t even get out of my driveway, let alone go to work.
       All this nasty snowy weather reminds of a story from back in the day. 
      Seems like it was early December 1975. I had just gotten my driver’s license a couple months earlier. I was in the tenth grade at the time.
      My folks had gone to visit with my dad’s grandmother in Barnsdall, Okla., a small town 40-miles north of Tulsa. I stayed home to attend choir practice at the First Baptist Church in downtown Tulsa that late Sunday afternoon.
       While at choir practice, a sleet and snowstorm hit Tulsa.
      I was driving my dad’s old work car, a 1959 Chevrolet Impala. It was a good car, but the defroster quit working and it was hard to see a foot in front of me.
      There I was, trying to make a decision about what to do. My parents taught me that if I had troubles to drive a certain route home. I decided to head home, driving with my head stuck out the window to see the road all the while sleet and snow was pelting my face. The windshield wipers were slipping back and forth, but it was doing no good without a defroster.
       I made it about three miles toward home when all of a sudden my folks came to my rescue. I was never so glad to see them. I moved over and my dad slid under the steering wheel and got us home safely.
      I remember the time in the late 1990s when I working for the North English Record. It was a cold, icy winter day. A semitruck loaded with hogs had slid off the road east of South English and some of the critters had broken out of their traveling confinement and were roaming about on Highway 22.
       I’m thinking, “What a great photo opportunity.” I took the company GEO Metro and headed south and then east toward the accident scene.
       The roads were icy and awful and I’m thankful I didn’t slide into the ditch. I should have stayed home. Well, I got some great photos and one of them won a state newspaper spot photography award.
          I’ll probably never do that again. 
        If that where today, Debbie (my voice of reason) would have something to say about it if I gave it any thought.
          I’m thankful for her wisdom, common sense and love. I’m a blessed man.
          And, the warmer weather will be here sooner than you think.
          Have a great week and always remember that “Good Things are Happening,” every day.