Well, I haven't added to the blog in a few days and man, are there things to tell you!Tues. night Dec. 15th, 2009 - We went to Mason's School, Mountain View Elementary, for a musical that he, and the whole 2nd grade class, was in. That is him to the left of the mic singing an old time Rock & Roll Christmas Tune. Mason did very well and he was wearing a green elf hat.
Wed. night Dec. 16th, 2009 - We had Christmas at Paula's parents house, Raymond & Joyce Compton. Paula's sister, Cindy was in from sunny florida and was loving our much cooler weather. (Not) We had a fabulous dinner and enjoyed the time spent together. As you can see we had a great time. look at all of those presents under the tree. Mason is in the center, Paula on the left, Cindy on the right, Jordan to the left of mason and Paula's dad, Raymond, is behind Mason. I couldn't be in the picture. i was taking the picture!The weatherman was starting to hint of some weekend winter type weather, but we all planned for the big trip over "Big A Mountain" to Fletcher's Ridge in Bucanan County for the Big Cristmas parties on both of Paula's parents sides of the family. The Comptons side on Friday night and the Farmers on Saturday night, but.....
Thursday Dec. 17th, 2009 - This was my last day at work for a while, so I was around the office for a large protion of the day. The weatherman was kicking things up and calling for a large snow to start on Friday around 4 pm. I worked out for Robyn Blankenship to get my 4 wheel drive vehicle due to the proposed 18 inch snow.
Thursday night, I attended the James Evans Masonic Lodge #72 meeting and served in the position of Senior Deacon for this meeting. We did not have the scheduled elections for this Dec. meeting, so they should be held in January 2010.
Friday Dec. 18th, 2009 - After sleeping in then getting e few things together, The Schools all anounced that they were closing 2 hours early due to the incoming weather. Well, Paula decided that we should leave for the country 2 hours earlier also to get a head start on the weather. I went to school and picked up Mason. we packed quickly, dropped Max off at my mom & dad's. They would surely spoil the dog while we were gone. We picked up Jordan and by 2 pm we were heading up Christiansburg Mountain on I-81. We hadn't eaten, so we planned to stop at the Christiansburg exit. When we came off the exit, it was starting to snow. While in McDonalds, it started to really stick to the grass. We jumped back in the car and headed south. We were getting text messages about every 15 minutes from Cindy, Paula's Sister, on the road conditions at the mile marker that they were passing. they were almost a hour ahead of us.
Well we got stuck in standstill traffic in Mongomery County due to wrecks. The road was becoming very slippery and there were crashes everywhere. We saw vehicles in ditches, into guardrails, and some upside down. after a brief stop there, we moved on and got to the south side on Wytheville. It was snowing very hard and suddenly the traffic just stopped. We were at a standstill for nearly 5 1/2 hrs.
Now this was not the most pleasant situation, but we had gas, heat, bottled water, chips and swiss cheese. We had some cake if needed and extra blankets. the longer we set the deeper the snow seemed to get. We listend to different radio stations, but none seemed to give us the news we needed. the best information came from K-92 fm out of Roanoke. They are located an hour away, but they knew and spoke about our situation quite a bit. We sang to the songs and talked about old times and just many diferent things. In today's life, we are moving so fast, that it wasn't so bad being stuck out there at mile marker 68 on I-81 with all of the truckers.
I would go and talk to a truck driver behind me every so often. He would inform me of what he was hearing over the CB from the other truckers. They had a mess of a wreck ahead of us and after the trucks had set for so long, they couldn't get them moving in the large amounts of snow that was piling up on the roadway. He told me a story of a single mom with a 5 month old baby. She had milk but no way to heat the bottle. A truck driver with a microwave heated it for her. He would ask if we were okay every time I went to talk to him. I'd say yeah, we're fine, we have gas and food and we had made contact with frineds by use of cell, which had a poor signal, and they had reserved us a room for the night in Marion, if we ever got to moving again.
Here we were, heading for the country for christmas, stuck in traffic, and three cell phones just working overtime. We had a hard time getting the signal to go out, but we did after much moving around inside of the vehicle.
Paula learned that Cindy was stuck in Abingdon. She learned that her mom & dad had made it to her grandmothers on Fletcher's Ridge after attending the Friday night party that we missed while sitting at mm 68. They reported the snow was getting deep and they had lost power.
Finally we saw the yellow lights of a salt truck over the hill. The trucker behind me had told me that they were going to be working their way from the front of the blockage back to us. They had to move the trucks out as they came back to get the road open. I walked up to the Highway worker and he said they were salting the road around each truck and working their way back to us. I witnessed these huge truck and trailers slide and spin and then slowly inch forward and head on out down the road. He finally reached us. The highway man asked if he got the truck beside us moved, would I be able to get out. I replied "yes" and he said "okay" and that he was sorry for taking so log to get us out. We were happy to be moving and thanked him with a huge smile.
I-81 was a mess the snow was deep, our windshield wipers were freezing up and it was snowing so hard. We finally got off the interstate in Marion and found our motel. It wasn't the grandest, by any means, but it was off of that interstate. All of the motels were full. Cindy had gotten back to Abingdon and found a room at a Hampton Inn as did Dean, Paula's cousin, who was coming in for Chrsitmas too, but from Raliegh, NC.
I got the kids and the wife all settled in our room and I went back out in search of food. I found a McDonalds all lit up like an Oasis in the middle of the desert. I grabbed a bunch of food from the drive through and arrived back at the room to find my family huddled around the television watching "Christmas Vacation", a true Christmas classic. We ate and went to sleep.
The photo above was taken the next morning of the motel we stayed at. It was called the Magnuson Inn, or something like that, but thank goodness they were there for us.
Saturday Dec. 19th, 2009 - After sleeping in, since we didn't get to sleep until around midnight the night before, we all got up, showered, and dug the Kia out. People were leaving the motel and sliding all over the place. Checkout was at 11am, so we got out just in time. We needed food and guess where we went. McDonalds again. While at McDonalds, we were on the cell phones trying to determine if we were going on to Fletcher's Ridge or back to Roanoke. I talked to my dad and it was still snowing in Roanoke. There was no power at Fletcher's Ridge and there were trees down blocking roads, so we decided to go back home. Cindy left for Florida.
The roads were in great shape going back north on 81 until be got to Radford. Stuck again. I tried talking to truckers again and finally, I got that little Kia Borrego off at the Radford Exit, hit route 11 through Christiansburg and down 460 into Salem, Va. Finally got home just before dark. The roads were bad around our house so I couldn't go get Max and decided to watch the Saints play on TV. You know what, They lost to the Dallas Cowboys. They are not undefeated anymore. Saints are now 13 -1 but hey, maybe they can still get to the Superbowl!! Who Dat?
Sunday Dec. 20th, 2009 - Spent the day digging out, went grocery shopping and just happy to be home.
My dad brought Max home. he seemed happy to be back too. I had to shovel out a place in the grass for him to go to the bathroom. The poor dog sure is picky.
Planning on watching movies tonight and relaxing with my family in front of the fire, maybe a glass of wine by the Christmas Tree with Paula later.
I sure hope you are having a very Merry Christmas! By they way, I think they said we had 19 inches of snow. The Weather channel broadcast live from Roanoke, VA too, during the storm.
My mom works for Friendship Retirement Center as the head of Dietary and she has had to work this weekend while my dad was busy picking people up to get them to work. Even though the weather is bad, those folks in the retirement center still have to eat and have ther basic needs addressed. Mom & Dad are going to Florida on Christmas Day though. I hope they have a great time and enjoy the warmer weather. I'll take the sand over the snow any day!
Christmas is coming fast, be careful. I have got to figure out a way to get to Florida too.
Gary D. Huffman
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