My mom, sister, two nieces, the boys, and I were all on our way home from a day of being out and about when we happened upon a huge traffic back-up, about 17 miles from home. We assumed that since it was 5:15 p.m. on the Friday before Christmas, it was probably just some heavy traffic. Surely it would get moving. Ha! Ha! Ha! Silly, foolish us.
We learned, via a news station on the radio, that there was a jacknifed semi a mile or two south of us. From the exit where the accident occurred, the interstate was closed. Of course, there was nowhere to go, so we sat in the left lane, doing exactly that. I noticed there was a "Reduce Speed Ahead" sign. Oh, the irony.
It took us ONE HOUR & FIFTY-FIVE MINUTES to drive approximately two miles. Well, that was WHEN we were actually driving. What totally gets me, though, is the people who deem themselves more important or in more of a hurry than the rest of the tons of people waiting for things to clear up. They take off and drive down the shoulder AROUND EVERYONE ELSE!! What the heck?!?! I could understand there may be a person or two with a true emergency. But there were WAAAY more than a few taking that route.
Adding to our frustration and discomfort - full bladders. Man. It was dark and cold and you never really knew if the traffic might start moving. Not a good combination.
On a happy note (yes, there is a positive side to all this), we had a mini DVD player which entertained my four year old niece quite nicely. My sister even brought 4-5 movies, not just one or two. Definitely a providential move. We had a mostly full tank of gas. We had snacks and water. Although water was somewhat out of the question for the time being. We were in a warm van. It wasn't raining or snowing or blizzarding (we are supposed to have cold and snow tomorrow). We were only a couple miles from the exit, not in the previous couple of miles, enduring an even longer wait. There definitely could've been worse circumstances. Always look on the bright side, right? It served us well.
After our two-hour crawl, we finally made it to the exit and over to a grocery store for a quick restroom break before the last leg of our journey. I'm not sure about my mom and sister, but we had dinner at 9:00pm! At least we had dinner, right?
Turns out that the interstate was closed for three hours. Glad we didn't have to sit there that long. We'd have been making a quick run to a dark field.
1 comment:
Hi Dianne,
Just stopping by to say thank you for entering the Great Cakes Soapworks giveaway on Fiddledeedee and wish you all the best!!
Wow. I can remember sitting in traffic on the way to Acquire the Fire a couple months ago with a vanload of teenagers. We opted to exit the slow interstate, only to be held up by a train!!
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