We start our day in gray tones….
A few Greenies warm us up.
Woo-hoo! Now we’re ready to rumble!
=(^+^)=
Officially, two and a quarter inches/ 5,7cm of snow fell while I was in dialysis. From light flurries when I drove to the hospital to enough to bog my VW Golf SportWagen down if not careful, I also paid too little attention to the predicted weather and was out in a light jacket in heavy coat weather! Saturday’s snowstorm dropped more inches of fluffy stuff than the official record if my experience driving in it beats that official record.
Snow frog is gone. Remember how it helped show how deep snow got after a storm?
I miss snow frog!
Kristen, the hospital nutritionist and an old friend from my Mississippi Avenue days, offered to drive my car from the parking spot to the pick-up spot, just a few feet in good road time, but an ordeal for a walker user in deep snow. Either that, she said, or she’d shovel the path to my parked car! That would have been heroic! I settled for the pick-up spot when I looked outside and saw just how much snow dumped from the clouds in about five hours.
Taken at 6:30 Monday morning. Without a runner’s light strapped on my head, this area is lit only by that streetlight on the next lane over and a house light on the first unit to the left of my car. Frankly, without the light strapped on my head, I am very vulnerable to falls. Saturday morning, that streetlight was NOT lit when I left the apartment a bit after 4:00 AM!
Kristen backed the car over to the pick-up spot, getting my car stuck just before centering it on the cleared sidewalk from the hospital door to the pick-up spot. She cleared snow around all four wheels and under the car where the wheels would go, then tried to move it into position for me. With a spin of the front drive wheels till they hit a spot with good traction, she accomplished what would have been hell for me to do.
My car in position, it’ wa my turn to brave drifts and partially cleared main streets till I hit 6th Street and my lane, Lane 2. I headed out of the hospital parking lot, going in reverse of the traffic direction normally taken since Kristen backed my car into position. The correct direction lead to unplowed parts of the parking lot, so I headed the wrong way, where a plowed path looked best for me to try. Of course, driving on the wrong side, I had a plow coming toward me just before I came to the parking lot stop sign at the main street, Box Butte Avenue.
Fearful of getting stuck – a nightmare for a person with a disability and who gets around with a walker! – I threw caution to the wind and bolted through the stop sign. My rationale: get caught and fined versus getting stopped by the police and stuck, a fine is preferable since the policeman would be there to get me unstuck. LOL!
You can see the unhelpful light on the left in this photo. See any other cause for concern? Yes, the unused side of the parking spot has been cleared, but the mess around my car Monday morning was a slip-and-fall hazard I need to be alert to if it’s like this when I leave for dialysis this morning. (The person who mows the lawn tipped the handicapped parking spot sign, not me! I’ve left it that way in the hope he will feel guilty and straighten it up.).
Yes, I break the law at all stop signs or risk getting stuck in deep snow. The snow on 6th Street was partially cleared – one lane! – making it scary if I had any traffic coming toward me. Fortunately, no one was on the street with me and Lane 2 is just a short drive from the corner. No vehicles drove down the lane making a cleared path before I tried my luck. I made it to my parking spot, I backed in, then almost slipped out of the car trying to get out, said lots of bad words, tried again and succeeded.
Maneuvering through deep snow with a walker is hard. If you aren’t careful, you can bog down and tumble forward! No kidding! The alternative is to push through the snow as best you can till you sense you might bog down then lift the walker and set it down as far forward as you think you can move yourself safely.
It took me a long time – almost 10 minutes – to get from my car through the deep snow that hadn’t yet been cleared from the parking spot, lane, or my walk, to my door.
I sure was glad I stupidly wore a light jacket that morning! And Andy love, love, loved all the snow I carried into the apartment with me on my feet and the walker because he likes to lick snow.
Glad you made it safely.
Me, too! It wasn’t guaranteed.
I know. I hate driving in the snow.
I can get around in it most times, but definitely prefer not to go out in it if circumstances allow me to avoid it!
Glad you made it home okay, Doug. It was wise to not do a complete stop at stop signs. Even though I had no worries about driving in the snow decades ago, I try my best to avoid it now, and I’m not using a walker.
Me, too. As long as I can stay in motion, my chances are best.
Glad you got home safely. Could you take an Uber on bad days or is there a van for the elderly?
There is a bus service that dialysis patients can take for free if they are going to or from the dialysis drop off. In fact, when Kristen was maneuvering my car up to the drop off point, the bus was waiting a bit of the way for her, then me to move. It is $1.00 a ride otherwise, and a good bet for getting places, though it starts service at 6:00 AM, about 90 minutes too late to get me to the hospital. It isn’t practical as long as there is any possibility of getting home in my car. As it was, I couldn’t leave my car where it was. I don’t think there is uber in my town, since the city has that bus service that also features handicap access features for people in wheelchairs. The one time I used it – one of the nurses came over to my apartment and picked me up when I called and told her my car wouldn’t start in the -27 degree weather/ -33 degrees C – the driver made me carry my walker up the stairs instead of loading me on the handicap ramp!
Glad you made it safely home Doug ! What a blessing that Kristen The Nutritionist was there to provide food for your soul !
Kristen and her family were the best of neighbors where I used to live. What she did was typical of that family.
That was some ordeal, Doug! It sounds like you could use some kind of transportation service or and All Wheel Drive vehicle. Kristen sounds like a friend who is worth her weight in gold. The world could use more people like her. I am glad she is looking out for you!
There is a city-provided bus service that could have got me home, but that would be a complication then since my car was in the drop off point used to drop off or pick up dialysis patients. I couldn’t leave it there, and if I had, then I’d have to catch the bus back to the hospital later to take it home!
More snow than you might want and very difficult conditions!
It was a mess but survivable!
I have several friends with walkers who would not have managed that “short” walk well. Perhaps you need backup transportation for days like that. It’s too bad a nice neighbor didn’t shovel for you.
I live in a senior complex. There is no one living in the apartment directly across from me, the person living next to that apartment is unlikely to scoop walks because she is, like me, dependent on the landlord’s snow removal service, and the people in the apartment that’s the north half of my duplex are wheelchair-bound (the wife) and gets around with a walker (the husband). The snowstorm began slightly before I went to dialysis, and was still dumping snow when I left the hospital five hours later. Typically, snow removal starts after the storm is done. Some preliminary removal was done on the snow routes, which includes most of the way to my apartment, but not the last block, where I easily could get stuck. There is one intersection that continues down the main street and has a turning lane that gets less traffic that was “iffy”, though I managed to get to it when I had the greenlight. I probably would have been stuck there otherwise! The long of it, it was easy getting to dialysis, but hard leaving. Dialysis is not optional. Living as I do where snow can stop activity, I wouldn’t have gone out if I knew heavy snow was forecast because I know the complications it causes physically fit people, let alone me, but…. Yes, dialysis is one complication, literally a medical emergency if skipped for too long, that you go to if at all possible.
I suspected that your neighbors were in the same boat as you. You did an amazing job of getting yourself home! Let’s hope this is the last one at least on a dialysis day.
Me, too! I’m not snow fan.
Do you have Uber or Lyft in your area that could pick you up or a service that might take you to your appointments on days like that? That sounds a bit scary and dangerous.
The city has a bus service, but leaving the car in the hospital parking lot wasn’t an option because there are reserved spots for dialysis patients, which is given Monday through Saturday in the morning and afternoon. Also, my car would have been in the way of the snowplow, so I would have been blocked in with snow had I left my car there without at least tryintg to get out of the way.
Snow Frog!
Yes, a good indicator of depth of the snow!
This all makes your dialysis days so much harder. I don’t use a walker, but if I fall, I can’t get up without assistance
Thanks to taking care of my elderly parents before they had to go into a care center, I had to help my father get up from falls several times. He had a rotator cuff injury that made pulling him up by his hands too painful for him to endure. I’d wrap a blanket around his back and pull up. What worked better, though, was to help him get on his hands and knees near a solid object – chair or bed, for example – and he had sufficient upper body strength to work his way up. It still was painful for him, but he controlled the level during the maneuver. My mother, on the other hand, taught me how to fall (!), basically go limp when one felt a fall come on and take care not to bang one’s head. Between the two, I learned how to fall and get up in my old age!
Two good lessons following my own practice. Mind you, I learned how to fall on the rugby field 🙂
Excellent! That would be a perfect training ground for falls.
Cripes, Doug! I’m no rookie when it comes to driving in a winter storm or its aftermath, but then I never had to do it while having to use a walker or worrying about a disability. Definitely roll through the stop signs if it means avoiding getting stuck in the snow: I remember after a particularly awful snowstorm, my husband was driving his clunky old Ford sedan behind a city bus when it suddenly stopped in front of us. It dropped off a passenger on the curb, then lumbered off, while we sat stuck on a patch of icy, ridged snow. My husband swore like a longshoreman before throwing the car into reverse, then drive, in order to rock it out of the snow. And of course the other drivers didn’t give us any leeway, but honked and swerved around us. It taught me never to follow a city bus, and to never stop when driving in heavy snow. I think that was also the last winter we had that ancient ’72 Ford sedan. My father delivered my old Toyota Corolla from my college days, which oddly did a lot better on snow than the Ford. Take care!
My VW Gold SportWagen handles well in snow, but it does high center if the snow is deep. I’ve stuck it four times in almost seven years. It does best in deep snow if someone else has driven through it first and I can follow their trail. I’ve been a snow-driver all my life, so know not to go out into it if there is any reason short of life to do so.
Hi dear Doug, I worried now about your hospital visit. But yes, how nice your friend helped you. The snowy days still there… Isn’t any service of hospital coming to you and take you… especially when the weather like that. I am so glad you did great without any negative event. But dear Doug, be careful, and should be a better and safety way too, I talk aloud with you because really I worried. Have a nice day dear friend, Love and Hugs for you both, nia
There is a bus service provided by the city, nia, but it starts after I have to be at the hospital. As far as taking it after dialuysis, I would have had to leave my car at the hospital parling lot that day, and they werte just starting to plow the snow off the parking lot when I left. Hadf I left my car there, the plow would have blocked me in with more snow when it cleared the pavement around my car, a worse situation than the one I faced trying to leave during the snowstorm.
The black and white pics are interesting, and Andy looks perky in the color photo. Yikes at all that snow and the ordeal of getting home on it! That was nice of Kristen to help get you started. Snow Frog was a cutie!
Yes, I miss Snow Frog’s grin when I leave the apartment! I was lucky Kristen had come to the dialysis room to give us patients updates on out blood tests. She used to be a neighbor and she and her family were the best of friends and neighbors. They are very nice people!