Not Loving Snow Right Now

So on Monday night, this blizzard rolls in. So I had to miss work on Tuesday, because though my car was in the garage, the snow outside was already a foot thick and it was still coming down hard.

The next day, Wednesday, I got out with a shovel and had to dig a trench down the side of my house from the garage behind the house to the fence. It wasn't hard, because the snow was loosely packed. It was almost like shoveling marshmallow or something. It took a lot longer than I expected, though, because I had to go something like 50 yards. It didn't matter anyway, because work called at 3:30 p.m. to say that I didn't need to come in. They were closing the store a half-hour before my shift was supposed to start. So I got the trench shoveled out through snow which was piled 3 ft high in places.

Thursday, I got in my car and tried to drive to work. I got halfway down the Death Star trench, and my car got stuck; I hadn't shoveled it out quite wide enough in that spot. So I had to roll down the window and crawl out onto the hood, because the snow was literally as deep as the window at that point. I got the car dug out and drove down to the end of the drive, but gave up at that point, afraid to brave the actual streets from all the reports I was hearing.

Yesterday, I tried again. Got in my car and pulled out to get into the street. Literally got stuck 6 feet from my driveway. Looked up and down the street and saw four other cars stuck and abandoned and decided to quit. Later in the day, I walked to the Med-X drugstore and bought a little food. It took an hour and a half, and I fell seven or eight times, but the snow was soft, so I didn't hurt myself. On the other hand, none of the streets were very clear, even the main streets. I missed work again. An entire week of income, gone.

I really don't get why I'm so skittish about leaving my house this time. Maybe it's just that this level of snow is unprecedented in the time I've lived in Tulsa, but I don't know. I think it may be just because this car is an automatic, so I don't feel as if I have as much control driving it. Or maybe it's related to the greater crisis of confidence I've had in every aspect of my life, so I tend to shut down more easily, rather than rise to the challenges. Or maybe it's the related fact that my current job has no real responsibilities, not like the Army, or my supervisory positions at TV Guide and the station where I had to lead by example. There's nothing resting on my shoulders other than my own fate.

All I know is, in previous situations like this, I got out and overcame the challenges and got to work even when other people were staying in. And this time, I haven't. I've shut myself up for the most part and just tried to ride things out. But I've lost a week's worth of income in the meantime.

So I really need to hope people start buying Death Wave. And if you can, please spread the word about Death Wave. It's available right now, it's affordable, it's a fast read, and it's not exactly like anything else you've ever read before. And you don't need a Kindle to read it. Amazon has reader software for the PC, as well as other mobile devices like i-Pads and smart phones. And it's in mobi format, so you can also read on Palm devices with Mobipocket Reader.

Sample chapters can be found here (with more publishing this coming Tuesday). Any help I can get in spreading the word would be appreciated.

(ETA: I just got back from a one-hour drive around the block and figured out two problems. Number one, the city has done nothing with the streets here. They plowed Pine, the main street in these parts, but the secondary streets have nothing, not even sand, and the residential streets have less than nothing. And number two, I hadn't realized how bad my tires were. I got a really good look at them while I was shoveling ice and snow out from underneath them, and they need replacing. Problem is, I can't even afford basic living expenses right now, let alone tires.)