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moderately eventful day
So...if you aren't on Facebook, you missed my phone post this morning of the picture of the SNOW OUTSIDE MY WINDOW WTF.
It wasn't really that bad in town, but today Paul, Becky, and I were going to Durango to teach an outreach class. (Yes,![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
isiscolo, it's another "You were out in THAT?" kind of story.) The first inkling I had that this might be a more...challenging...sort of day than usual was when Becky was late meeting us at Paul's house because an 18-wheeler had gone off of the road on the way up from Towaoc and there was a bit of a traffic jam. She showed up around 8; we'd planned to leave at 7:45 and get to the school around 9. Not so bad, yet; we'd just have to drive kinda fast.
I was very happy that I didn't volunteer to drive to Durango. The road conditions rapidly deteriorated once we left Cortez, and soon Paul was driving at 45mph instead of 65...then 40...then 35...
...and we passed three cars that had gone off the road, including one big ol' Ford F-something-or-other that was trying to get back ON the road.
Then, around the Cherry Creek area, the several cars we were behind started slowing down a LOT, because there were two or three cars that had slid partly off the road, but not enough that anyone could bypass them without crossing into the other lane. People were out of their cars, trying to affix chains and push others straight. Paul was saying "don't stop, if we stop we're screwed, don't STOP"--and of course the big damn propane truck STOPPED. So we stopped.
(Oh, did I mention that we were driving a fifteen passenger van? Not a...light vehicle.)
Another pickup slid. The guy got out and started putting chains on. Other cars started moving. Paul tried to follow, to no avail. A string of expletives like I rarely hear him utter were loosed.
(Did I mention this was 9 o'clock?)
After a few futile attempts to get unstuck (and discovering that the van was not stocked with a shovel, or sand, or chains, or any sort of unsticking devices), a Forest Service truck stopped, and a nice but decidedly underdressed (t-shirt and jeans) guy got out and offered to try to pull us up the hill a bit. He failed, and only got himself stuck.
Fortunately, a sand truck had gone by and scattered a little tiny bit of sand in the other lane. So Paul put it in reverse until the tires hit the sand, and got it moving again.
We got to the school at 10.
So...it turned out that one of the teachers who knew what was going on was out; there were no lesson plans for the sub so she had NO idea what we (uh, meaning I) needed, and the other teacher who did know what was going on wasn't able, apparently, to stay in either of the other two classrooms we were using, leaving Becky and Paul to manage totally alien classes on their own (not that I was in much better of a situation with a clueless sub). So...we had to teach what is normally a three-hour class in 1.5 hours.
Eeesh.
Anyway, we did go out to lunch after, and did a little random Durango shopping (BENDER'S GAME, BABY!), and then went back to campus. The roads were fine on the way home, which was good for me, the driver :D
It wasn't really that bad in town, but today Paul, Becky, and I were going to Durango to teach an outreach class. (Yes,
isiscolo, it's another "You were out in THAT?" kind of story.) The first inkling I had that this might be a more...challenging...sort of day than usual was when Becky was late meeting us at Paul's house because an 18-wheeler had gone off of the road on the way up from Towaoc and there was a bit of a traffic jam. She showed up around 8; we'd planned to leave at 7:45 and get to the school around 9. Not so bad, yet; we'd just have to drive kinda fast. I was very happy that I didn't volunteer to drive to Durango. The road conditions rapidly deteriorated once we left Cortez, and soon Paul was driving at 45mph instead of 65...then 40...then 35...
...and we passed three cars that had gone off the road, including one big ol' Ford F-something-or-other that was trying to get back ON the road.
Then, around the Cherry Creek area, the several cars we were behind started slowing down a LOT, because there were two or three cars that had slid partly off the road, but not enough that anyone could bypass them without crossing into the other lane. People were out of their cars, trying to affix chains and push others straight. Paul was saying "don't stop, if we stop we're screwed, don't STOP"--and of course the big damn propane truck STOPPED. So we stopped.
(Oh, did I mention that we were driving a fifteen passenger van? Not a...light vehicle.)
Another pickup slid. The guy got out and started putting chains on. Other cars started moving. Paul tried to follow, to no avail. A string of expletives like I rarely hear him utter were loosed.
(Did I mention this was 9 o'clock?)
After a few futile attempts to get unstuck (and discovering that the van was not stocked with a shovel, or sand, or chains, or any sort of unsticking devices), a Forest Service truck stopped, and a nice but decidedly underdressed (t-shirt and jeans) guy got out and offered to try to pull us up the hill a bit. He failed, and only got himself stuck.
Fortunately, a sand truck had gone by and scattered a little tiny bit of sand in the other lane. So Paul put it in reverse until the tires hit the sand, and got it moving again.
We got to the school at 10.
So...it turned out that one of the teachers who knew what was going on was out; there were no lesson plans for the sub so she had NO idea what we (uh, meaning I) needed, and the other teacher who did know what was going on wasn't able, apparently, to stay in either of the other two classrooms we were using, leaving Becky and Paul to manage totally alien classes on their own (not that I was in much better of a situation with a clueless sub). So...we had to teach what is normally a three-hour class in 1.5 hours.
Eeesh.
Anyway, we did go out to lunch after, and did a little random Durango shopping (BENDER'S GAME, BABY!), and then went back to campus. The roads were fine on the way home, which was good for me, the driver :D