No mas!

I sincerely hope everybody who has complained over the last few years of our “mild” winters is happy.

This, as you probably know, has not been a “mild” winter. It has been a wild winter.

And I, for one, have had enough. No mas (as former boxer Roberto Duran said to Sugar Ray Leonard)! We give up! No more! I have seen enough snow and ice to last me several years.

It’s not bad enough we have had snow and ice for what seems like the last month, but our school kids are going to be in school until July 4 if this crud keeps up.

So far, I know of one person who has suffered a broken hip and another with broken ribs from falls on the ice.

I considered myself lucky, considering I can’t pull the old “Gene Machine” truck up the drive way when the white crap is on the ground. So…I had successfully made the trek up and down the driveway several times back last week when it was good and icy.

Last Thursday, I had to park again at the end of the driveway and made the perilous climb to safely find the comforts of home. I remembered something in my truck. It wasn’t important, but it was notes for a story I planned to do.

Should I risk it? Ugh, finally, my sometimes strong work ethic prevailed. I must do it! I am guy! I changed out of my dress shoes and put on some tennis shoes with traction.

I had discovered that walking on the snow instead of the ice provided better traction. As I slowly made my way down the STEEP hill, I felt my trusty shoes give way and I about lost it. But no, I got my balance back, only to find out that I was now skiing down the driveway.

I had gotten about halfway down the driveway and had hoped to slide the rest of the way when the feet realized there were no skis on and gave way. Fortunately nobody was watching, especially with a camera.

I landed shoulder first, followed by hip and managed to slide a few feet more. First thing I did was look around to make sure nobody saw this. There was no laughter or gasp so I felt safe, except I wasn’t so sure that my shoulder was not broken and my hip felt like it made contact with the other one.

Forty-seven year old guys don’t handle falls like this very well. I was so sore that I couldn’t sleep that night. Of course, it didn’t help that the next morning when I got to work, I stepped out of the truck and the first step was a doozy. Just so my left elbow would not be left out on the pain, it struck something and got a nasty bump and bruise.

Somebody was driving by and watched my performance. I wasn’t sure, but thought I provided a good laugh.

The pain has finally gone away for the most part, it has been over a week now. It has provided some good conversation pointers. Us guys, since we are guys, talk and compare the number of falls and the severity.

Naturally, we have to describe everything that happened and how brave we were to overcome the falls and continue to battle the snow and ice.

And again, the snow came. No falls this time. But I drove my wife’s Explorer to the video store last night to get her a movie. We had been able to drive her ride all the way up the hill, but not this time.

I got to the top and stalled. No, this is not the first time this has happened. I decided to coast backwards down the driveway and park there.

But noooo. The Explorer started sliding all over the driveway and I managed to get one tire over the edge of the concrete border, which stands several inches high and was stuck. There was a drop off of several feet just a couple of feet away and I really didn’t want her vehicle down there.

Drats. This was not good. I really did not want to call a tow truck out to rescue her vehicle and fortunately her son and a friend happened to show up and we somehow got the vehicle loose. Let’s hope it still works, eh?