Snow Day Mark 3

I made it into work yesterday. The roads were clear until I got to Reading, where it rapidly became obvious that the Council hadn't gritted. I am not impressed.

Seriously. The road "in" from the M4 is the A329; it is motorway for about a mile, until the first junction. Motorways are managed by the Highways Agency. "A" roads are managed by councils. The A329 is 4 lanes, 2 each way. Within 400 metres of the first junction, our two lanes were reduced to one almost clear lane showing two tyre marks with snow in the middle. And it got worse the further I drove. It was obvious that the road was only clear because of volume of traffic. (NB, it snowed Wednesday. This was Friday.)

Parking at work was an adventure, since the snow was at least 6 inches (15cm) deep. Four staff were supervising traffic, whilst a digger cleared half the car park. Then the email came out to move our cars and we all swapped to the other side of the car park.

Thought you'd like to see some snow photos. Here is the view from our kitchen window, taken on Wednesday.


And the view from the back door. Pretty.


Also, here is the front step, which we salted on Wednesday.


Noticed yesterday that part of it was obviously being held together by the moss. Oops! No mortar:


We're now out of dishwasher salt. So was the supermarket yesterday; it appears I'm not the only person who had that idea.

On the work front: this time, I bought home the work laptop. We have more snow predicted for Sunday, but I think I'll be able to get to the office on Monday. They're talking about this weather lasting another 10 days, so I'm debating whether to ask for an SUV to be hired for my trip to Site the week after next. On the plus side, the off-road function should make it drivable on bad roads. On the downside, a) there is no guarantee its tyres will be better than the ones I have already (as I've said before, they don't do winter tyres around here); b) there is a high possibility, I won't get an SUV even though I've asked for it; and, c) I won't earn the £200+ mileage allowance I get for driving my own car (it costs me about £50 per Site visit, so I make a profit each trip). Any thoughts?

- Pam

Snow Day Mark 2

I didn't go to work today. it was a combination of things: the garage didn't finish working on the Toy yesterday (they'd had to order a part); DH was already committed to collecting his mum from the airport and driving her home; and due to the weather, the rail service has been operating an emergency timetable, which I can't rely on. (I checked the rail company's website last night before I went to bed and again this morning - it was impossible to work out when our trains were running. We may or may not have had one train an hour.) I emailed my boss at 6.30 this morning to tell him I wasn't coming in and that I'd take the day as leave. For a while, I kicked myself that I didn't bring home the company laptop on Tuesday night when I knew the weather would be bad - I'd looked at it, commented about it to my assistant, and then packed it away as normal.

Eventually I gave up worrying about work, logged out of the company webmail and got down to some serious day-time TV watching. Oh, and knitting. I've almost finished a pair of Baudelaire socks in UK Alpaca's Alpaca Sock Yarn (colour: charcoal). They're my first toe-up socks. I hope to wear them to work tomorrow (who needs to block socks?) so will photograph them when done.

It snowed yesterday until mid-afternoon. My poor MIL has suffered a temperature shock, flying in from the Gulf to sub-zero temperatures. Yesterday, she was sunbathing; today, she's sitting by the fire, wearing her warmest clothes to keep warm.

We've scattered dishwasher salt on the front step in an attempt to stop it icing up. Amazingly, it worked, dissolving the layer of snow that covered the step and the snow that landed after we salted. It's also killing off the resident moss and weeds that have colonized the mortar between the bricks that make up the step.

The Toy was ready for collection at 3pm today. The cause of his knocking noise? One of the rear tyre has worn badly on the inside and distorted. I was lucky it didn't blow out. The mechanics don't know why this has happened. Whatever caused it has happened since the start of August, when he was last serviced and they rotated the tyres. I asked about wheel alignment and camber (tilt) and they say that it isn't possible for the rear wheels to go off "true". The joints aren't built that way.

Sadly, with the Toy fixed, I have no excuses. It's back to work for me tomorrow.

- Pam

Snow Day

If you look at the news today, you'll see that Britain is in the grip of yet another snowfall. Work-wise, it doesn't affect me. I'd booked today off in order to get Toy fixed ASAP; since he has a problem with his wheels, I didn't want to drive one mile further than was necessary. On Monday, sacrificing a day off to get him fixed seemed the best option - today was the first day they could fit him in, they couldn't give me a loan car and whilst DH is currently driving his sister's car, that was also booked in for a service today so he couldn't drive me to work. Bad weather didn't rear its ugly head until yesterday, when the weather warnings came through. It snowed overnight; this morning, we dropped both cars off and walked back through virgin snow.

The first time I drove in snow, it was the week before Christmas 1999. I was sitting in the Metro (Toy's predecessor) at a set of traffic lights in Selsdon, south of London, when I realised the stuff making the strange wet blotches on the windscreen wasn't rain. It was snow! Further along, the Epsom Downs wore a nice snowy blanket. I remember feeling excited, like I'd finally made it as a driver, "Hello, world! I've driven in Snow!!!!".

When I got to work that morning, I quizzed everyone about how to drive in snow. I got fairly general advice: stay in second gear, brake slowly, double or treble the distance between the car and the one ahead, etc.

The next time I recall driving in snow was January 2003, when it started falling as I drove into the office car park on the morning I was due to fly to Australia for my sister's wedding (the flight was at 10pm). I sat in the office that day watching it fall, watching it settle, until 2pm when I turned to my then boss (PVC) and said I was leaving - I had a plane to catch and I couldn't risk staying any longer. PVC is Canadian. He responded with, "You're Australian. What do you know about driving in snow?" and proceeded to give me a driving lecture. It's thanks to him that I carry a bag of kitty litter in the boot during winter (for grip on the ice).

Fast forward to December 2009 and our current bout of snowy weather. You know about my journey home on the Monday before Christmas, but I haven't mentioned Friday 18th December. I was at Site. Thursday, it was snowing as I drove to the hotel - a dry snow, almost hail, that blew over the road like a dust storm, complete with swirls and eddies.

Thursday night was the Site Christmas Party at a big hotel so I stayed at the venue; Friday lunchtime was the Reading Finance Christmas Wake (we'd organised it and paid for it ourselves, without company support). The plan was that I'd claim driving time for once, leave the hotel before 8am, drive home as quickly as possible, collect DH who'd drop me at the station then get the express train into Reading for our party at 1pm. No drinking and driving for me.

Friday morning's news was full of talk about the overnight snowfalls and an impending "Big One" that was due to start "any minute now" and would be focused over Lincolnshire. Since there were clear skies when I left Scunthorpe, I thought it was safe to take my usual route instead of heading out to the M1 and adding an hour to the journey (usual route is country roads to Lincoln, go round the Lincoln bypass, then join the A1 near Newark. That'd take me to the M25 and home).

I was about a third of the way down the A1 when the Big One hit. Gradually, over the next 20 miles, we slowed down into a single file convoy of traffic, travelling at approximately 40 miles an hour. The snowfall got heavier and settled on the road. Every now and again, an idiot would wiz down the fast lane at 60 mph; that stopped after one of them spun out of control and ended up sideways with their nose across the central reservation.

We plodded on. The snow got heavier. The vehicles got slower. The road surface disappeared; even the tyre marks were filling up. At 10.30am I pulled into Colsterworth Services and considered my options. By this point, the A1 was practically stationary. There was no way I'd get to Reading for 1pm. It was time to admit defeat. I phoned the office and told them I wasn't going to make it. I phoned DH and told him where I was, then bought a coffee and sat in the Little Chef for an hour, reading, until the snow plough/gritter went through and the traffic started moving.

I gritted my teeth, got back in the Toy and set off again. The reason we'd ground to a stop became clear - there had been an accident closing the fast lane and the emergency vehicles were still clearing up when I drove past. The snowstorm eased. The road surface cleared. Driving got faster.

It was 3pm when I got home that day. I'd had a long scary drive. Sometimes, I'd been really frightened but mainly about getting stuck. I wasn't scared (most of the time) about crashing, only when those idiots went flying past at 60. I have never been more grateful to see the road works on the M25 near Watford.

- Pam

I want snow tyres (or chains)!

We had another snow fall yesterday morning. It was dry and fluffy stuff, when I went out to scrape it off the car. I got as far as clearing the driver's door when I thought "better be prepared" and dashed in doors to get a flask of coffee and my "handbag knitting". (I'll be damned if I'm stuck in the car for hours with nothing to knit.)

Crawled out to the motorway behind a string of other cars. I got half way out to the junction and considered turning back, deciding that if the M4 was bad I'd go down to the next junction and then come home. The 2 miles to the M4 were a combination of slip, slip, crawl, stop, look, slip. This is on a main road. Gritters? I'm not sure our local council has any.

They are predicting another week of this. I haven't got a clue where I'd buy them (and I've never driven with them) but I'm reaching the point where I want chains for the car. I thought about getting them last time England ground to a holt, in 2003. Why, oh, why didn't I????

- Pam

Pah! I'll see your Global Warming and raise you an Ice Age!

Unless you've been living like a hermit for the last week, you may have noticed that Britain has had a little problem with snow. It started snowing on Sunday night - there was a light covering when Steve left at 3.30am following our Superbowl Party. By the time I got up on Monday morning (around 9am), Britain had shut down. It's just as well we'd booked the day off to recover from watching NFL to the wee hours.

There were no trains, no buses, no flights. The roads weren't cleared. One of our guests (the Steelers fan) took 4.5 hours to drive the 90 miles home, a journey that on a bad day takes 2 hours (it's almost all motorway and highway driving). The other guest couldn't get home because there was no public transport.

Tuesday morning, I drove into work without any problems. We sat in the office watching the snow fall and the stuff already on the ground melt, both at the same time. A few miles away, my boss was unable to get to the end of his street, the snow was falling so heavily. Yesterday, the same thing happened. Last night, it snowed again. And, outside London, everything closed down again.

Honestly, it's embarrassing how this country can't cope with a bit of weather. Granted, this was the first heavy snowfall that we'd had since 2003, but they really had no excuse. This weather was predicted last week. The first time I saw a snow plough in action was this morning! Wonder what will happen if it gets seriously cold again?

- Pam

Reasons I have stash

Reasons I have Stash:-

1. Since I can't actually find the yarn stated in 99% of the patterns that I knit, I always buy one or two extra skeins "just in case". Sometimes, this yarn is a Godsend and will be used up before the garment is finished. Sometimes, it is destined to become scarves, hats, gloves or (if there is enough) another garment. Sometimes, it just ends up in stash waiting for inspiration to strike.
2. I don't really have a local yarn store, not one I can drop in on, hang around in, etc. My nearest LYS are Baron's, an overgrown market stall in Uxbridge caught in the 1970's, and Bunty's, but their range is limited to Rowan and Sirdar. Even to get to Bunty's takes a special effort. My regular yarn buying takes place at the Knit & Stitch Show every October, so when I'm there, I really stock up. I miss the days when I worked down the road from John Lewis' yarn department and could just wander in when my latest project was nearly finished, in order to buy yarn for the next one.
   
3. Projects-In-Waiting ("PIW"). In the blind hope that I'll find something suitable in a yarn I can afford, I carry a "want to knit" list in my Filofax complete with yarn quantities, notes about gauge, notions, etc. When I get lucky, the yarn goes into the PIW category in the stash. Sometimes, I'm efficient enough to include a photocopy of the relevant pattern when I pack the yarn away.
4. Yarn-desperately-seeking-a-project. As a side effect of buying my yarn mainly at shows, sometimes I "buy first, work out what to do with it later" using a rough rule of thumb to determine how much to get. (My rule of thumb is simple: a ball band once told me that to make a medium sized ladies sweater in DK yarn, you need approximately 700g. So, I go with that and try and buy one or two extra skeins if I can find them "just in case"). The yarn may be cheap (try £1 a ball for 100% Scandinavian wool I picked up at the last Knit & Stitch Show), it may be hard to find (100% DK Alpaca is not easy to obtain in the UK), or it may be rare (100% Wensleydale Longwool).
   
5. Sock wool. If I can't figure out what else to knit, I can always make another pair of socks - is any other explanation needed?

- Pam (enjoying a "snow day". The roads are closed and we're snowed in.)