Umm...

Y'ALL.

We're supposed to get up to 30 inches of snow before this time tomorrow night. You read that right. THIRTY. This is simultaneously awesome and kind of terrifying.

Freakout aside, I concluded some time back that I am completely in love with the weather up here. It gets warm, it gets cold, it rains, it snows. But unlike the south, it doesn't usually get SUPER hot, there aren't usually tornadoes... you get the idea. AND, people actually seem to understand how snow works, and nobody panics whenever 3 flakes fall out of the sky.

But the threat of "Snowpocalypse: Part Deux" is enough to send even the normally calm D.C. folks scurrying to collect the big items-- you know the drill: milk, toilet paper, bread, and beer.

Thursday night, I went to the grocery to stock up for the weekend. It was maybe 5 p.m., which is normally an ok time to go because nobody's gotten home from work yet, but the afternoon shoppers are already home. It's a bad sign when you walk in the door and there are no carts available at the front because they're all being used. I pushed through the looming panic attack and fought through the crowds to get all my stuff. Just to paint a picture here, this Giant grocery store near us is pretty big and usually well-staffed, but for some reason there always seems to be a huge line, and this was no exception. All of the registers were open, and the line for each went through the checkout area all the way back to the end of aisles. Total chaos. After getting my supplies, I got in line and waited. And waited. And waited. When all was said and done, my new grocery shopping friends and I had stood in line for an hour and 5 minutes.

In other words, I had a lot of time to stand there and think, mainly about shopping and American grocery habits in general.

Most of all, "convenience food." Pre-chopped onions, cracker-sized pre-cut cheese, bottled water. I think all of these things are ridiculous, especially bottled water. It's kind of my thing to hate at the moment. (When I get particularly worked up-- like after standing in a grocery line for an hour-- I wonder why it's legal to even sell that crap. "Support the landfills of tomorrow! Two dollars for future garbage that's full of something you can already get for basically free!" No thanks. Ok, rant over.) Anyway, I was standing there thinking what a waste of time and money most of these "convenience products" are, and it occured to me-- I hate frozen chicken. I know, I know, it's cheaper to buy chicken breasts in bulk and freeze them, instead of buying a new package fresh every day. I know this, and I do buy it in bulk and freeze it. Because it's cheaper, and easy to do. Really, I just hate de-frosting chicken. But regardless, someday, I swear I will only use fresh chicken. And then some girl will watch me in the grocery store and be like, "Seriously? Is it that hard to put a chicken breast in the fridge to thaw?"

Meanwhile, the snow continues to fall. This is going to be insane.

Y'all, I don't want to see what the "real north" is like in the winter time. If this is D.C., I'm kind of afraid to ever see Buffalo.

Baby, You Can Drive My Car

I have this theory about some skill sets that are pretty much necessary for success as an adult. I think you can learn to do something adequately, but there are certain rites of passage that you have to endure in order to be really good at said skill.

Take for example, driving. I, like most Americans teenagers in the days before graduated licenses and age restrictions, got my learner's permit at 15. In those days, in Alabama, it should be noted that the only rules separating a learner's permit from a full-fledged license was that the driver in question had to be over 15 years of age and enrolled in school. Once one passed a ridiculously easy written exam, there were pretty much no rules, other than that there had to be a licensed adult over age 21 in the car at all times, and they *should* be conscious. (Yes, really.)

The minute I turned 15, I passed my written test with flying colors, got my little plastic card with my picture on it and restriction "Y" (I assume it stands for youth? I don't know), and proceeded to scare the hell out of my parents for the next year behind the wheel of my first baby, otherwise known as "Joanie the Little Blue Oldsmobile." "Joanie" was actually my dad's car-- a 1994 Cutlass convertible, in turquoise!-- but it was deemed the easiest vehicle in the family for me to learn on. (Yes, I named the car. Like, as if.)

The first real driving adventure I had was the night of my 15th birthday. I'd had my permit for all of 5 hours, but when we went out to dinner to celebrate, I drove. I don't remember much about it, other than that I think I screamed the whole way (probably a 10 minute trip.) The real test came a few weeks later, when my mom taught me to parallel park in front of our church one morning right before the service to keep us from having to walk 3 blocks from the other lot. Literally, I learned to parallel park in front of God and everybody, and if I may say, it's still one of the things I'm best at. I've taught several of my friends. I should put it on my resume.

Fast forward about 10 years to this past Sunday. The local chapter of our beloved alma mater's alumni club held a reception for the outgoing Vice Chancellor and his wife. (For you non-Sewanee folk out there, the V.C. is basically the university president.) The party was at a house out in Chevy Chase, Maryland, which is a very nice suburb of D.C. However, we did have one small problem-- the house was 3 miles from the nearest Metro station. Now, we walk a lot up here, but 3 miles is definitely a little far-- especially if you're trudging through the snow in nice clothes. Enter our hero-- the zipcar!

Zipcars may be the most brilliant idea anyone has ever had. Here's how it works. You fill out an application, they approve you and give you a plastic card that works like a key. When you need a car, you go online, pick one in your area, and reserve it for as long as you need. Hourly rates range from about $8 to about $13, depending on the car. Gas and insurance are included. So basically, for the bargain price of your $50 a year membership fee, plus your $8-13 per hour rental, you have a car at your disposal. Compare that to the $200 per month parking fee at our apartment building, plus the cost of insuring a car in a major city, plus getting new tags, plus oil changes, gas, etc. etc. etc... yeah.

Anyway. My love of zipcars aside, this was going to be the only way to get out to Maryland on a snowy Sunday evening. I arranged to get a car near Georgetown law school-- turned out I totally hated the car, but that happens sometimes. Not a fan of the new Honda Civic hybrid though. I couldn't see out of it at all. Anyway, I picked Pete up, and we were off on our merry way. Then we looked at the map, and saw that Google was taking us through probably the craziest intersection in the entire world-- Dupont Circle. If you've never been there, here's what it's like: Imagine an English roundabout... except instead of having one circle with a few reasonably sized lanes that everyone drives through in a (somewhat) orderly fashion, there's the giant circle, plus at least 4 lanes at any given point. Oh and also, there's a giant median in between them. Also, instead of having like 4 "exit" streets that shoot off from the circle, there are like 8. Several of which also have a big triangle or median blocking you from going down them the wrong way. As for street signs... wait... what are those? I don't think we have those here.

We joked that they should take down the one sign telling you to stay on the outside circle for New Hampshire Ave, or whatever, and just put up a big sign saying "DuPont Circle. Good luck."

Anyway.

We don't know the area well enough to re-route ourselves. I mean, I could walk all around Dupont if I had to, but since we almost never drive... you're seeing the problem. Going out wasn't so horrible because it was still daytime, and as such, the streets hadn't frozen. Coming back was a different story. I mean, clearly we made it back safely, but it was a nerve-wracking experience. We had planned to re-do the directions so we could avoid DuPont in the dark with the snow, but then determined that it was actually safer to be on the big roads that had been salted and plowed, and then driven on all day. (Side note, can we discuss how much it blew my mind the first time I saw a snow plow? I really don't think I had ever seen one before this winter.) Fortunately we didn't encounter much ice until we got back to the parking lot to turn in the car, and that was manageable.

I think I need a Girl Scout badge for that one. It could have a penguin on it, like the one I got in 5th grade for camping when it was below freezing, and it could say "I drove through DuPont Circle TWICE in the snow in an unfamiliar car that I couldn't see out of. BEAT THAT!!"