2024 LC Thread

Way too cold here for me but the mailman was wearing shorts, that crazy fuck.

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dayum

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No, but I can see his house from here.

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my intrusive thoughts would involve owning a plastic gun with no serial numberā€¦

midwest weather update: had to drive my gfā€™s daughter back to case western in cleveland, normally takes an hour and 5-10 mins. took 2 hours.

been several years since iā€™ve driven with that dread of having to switch lanes bc you have to go through slushy ice at 45mph. it was POURING this icy slush for the middle hour or so of the drive, 33 degrees the whole time, i remember bc i told her the drive back is gonna suck even worse if it went down to 30.

get there and the city is fine.

drive home was 80mph the entire drive, 37 degrees and the turnpike was barely even wet.

fā€™ing northeast ohio.

I spent the winter of 1990 in Cleveland, and I drove down to Columbus most weekends. Although the frequent freezing rain was unpleasant, my strongest is memory is driving down to Columbus on I-71 on a cold, sunny morning after the previous eveningā€™s snowstorm, and losing control of my Toyota Celica on a long, clear downhill section, presumably hitting black ice and fishtailing against the shoulder lane guardrail, banging up the back end.

When I got out of the car, I could see that within a 100 yards of my spot at least 8 other cars had also slid off the highway. The ones who spun into the center, sunken grassy median were able to escape damage. I least I was still able to drive the rest of the way to Columbus despite the busted back end.

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worst drive i can remember was canton to youngstown on i-77/76 after a high school football playoff game.

we stopped counting the cars that slid off the road after 50 or so. had to be over 100 the whole drive.

75-80 minute drive took 4 1/2 hours. i was going 15-20mph the entire way. had to stop once for a few minutes bc a car was stuckā€¦ in the left hand lane. right lane was open, but you couldnā€™t change lanes or you were gonna slide and end up waiting for a tow truck.

most stressful drive of my life. buddies were all pounding beers, i was driving and felt every single slip in the pit of my stomach for HOURS.

our other friends ended up getting a hotel room outside of akron bc they didnā€™t want to keep driving :joy:

Is a sentence of community service slavery?

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In college I worked in a hospital pharmacy on weekends. One weekend while I was working, a blizzard hit. It was a level 3 emergency, so only emergency vehicles were supposed to be on the roads, but I still had to work. The pharmacy ran out of something they needed so they sent me in my Pontiac Grand Am to get it at another hospital 30 minutes away. It took me about 2.5 hours each way, going 15 mph. I couldnā€™t tell where the road was most of the time. Visibility was like 10 ft in front of my car. I must have passed 15 cars in the ditch. After that stressful 5 hours, I had a similar drive home.

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Since weā€™re sharing, a year after graduating college I had the awesome job of driving a delivery van for McKesson contractor - delivering drugs to pharmacies in northeastern Kansas.

One day it was zero degree weather, 50 mph winds, and dry snow blowing across all the roads creating total whiteout conditions. I could see maybe 3 dashed lines on the highway. The only solution was to try follow the tail lights of the car in front of you and hope everyone stayed at a constant 25-30 mph.

And then I somehow managed to snag the tire on the edge of the road. Had to change it in -50 windchill or whatever that was, with numb fingers, hoping nobody ran into me. I could do one or two lug nuts before needing to warm my hands in the car.

You could tell when we got back the bosses knew we were out there in pure hell. I came down with severe bronchitis that night. Good times.

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When I was working at the Shakespeare festival I was driving back to the see the family in Washington and my windshield wiper motor died in the mountains during a storm. Got a new one at a gas station and installed it myself and nearly lost all my fingers to the cold. Working outside in the cold is the worst. Was all set to go for a hike this morning until I saw the -9 on my watchā€¦

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Buncha boomers in this thread talking about walking uphill both ways to school in the snow.

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NPR says predictions are for ā€œheart attack snowā€. Speaking for myself, Iā€™m ready to pass the snow shovel to a new generation.

Yeah, I warn my dad every couple years to be careful if he needs to shovel. He hasnā€™t done the heavy stuff in a while though, I donā€™t think. Plus, he had a kidney transplant last year and I donā€™t think he has the strength to shovel, anyway.

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My dad continued to shovel his own walk until he finally moved into a retirement community at age 87. I tried so many times to get him to hire someone, hire someone myself, etc. If he had died that way I was just going to say that he died doing what he loved, I guess.

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Most of us folk in the tundra have snow blowers, I generally only shovel if itā€™s less than a 2-3" of light fluffy stuff. The wet snow sucks to shovel.

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Getting regular exercise like shoveling snow is part of how you get to be 87.

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When I was a kid, my dad had a snowblower and I thought it was the coolest thing ever.

My parents have a service that plows their driveway and I believe our neighbor comes over with a snowblower to do the front walk if itā€™s heavy. If itā€™s really light, my dad will do it (but again, with his surgery, donā€™t think he can right now). Guess I could ask. Itā€™s not like Iā€™m estranged from my parents or anything.

Heā€™s 88 now and this summer took a solo road trip from NC to NY for a wedding. I was like ā€œdoing this stuff has kept you young, but at some point this might not be the most awesome ideaā€.