JIMMY D
Wes Wada wrote:
Just the kind of day for a little entertainment...
Many years ago during a Christmas break, I made a drive from Twin Falls, Idaho, where I was teaching at a college, to Denver, Colorado where my immediate family lives.
On the return trip, as I crossed the Wyoming state line south of Cheyenne, the temperatures dipped below zero degrees. Heading westward, I had the nagging feeling that I was really in trouble...
Think about this: a car heater might be designed for raising the temperature inside your car 35 degrees. So, if it's 25 degrees outside, you drive in a comfortable 60 degree interior.
However, if the weather is minus 5 degrees, the car heater won't even heat up your car to above freezing! So as I motored along Interstate 80 headed west, the windshield was slowly but surely icing over and the car began turning into a walk-in freezer.
Along the way, I passed numerous cars that had spun off the road, had just quit, and had been abandoned. Saw another accident where a semi-truck tractor trailer rig had gone off the road in between the two roadways of the interstate highway and plunged into the space between the two overpass bridges to the road below. Things were gettin' surreal.
At nightfall, with a huge sigh of relief, I reached Rock Springs, Wyoming, one of the few times in my life I was actually glad to see Rock Springs, Wyoming. Checked into the motel and got a well-deserved night's rest as the overnight temperatures plunged to bone crushing minus 26.
The next morning, I go out to the car. The door lock is frozen solid. I heat up the key with a cigarette lighter, and the lock turns. I get inside, and the shift knob for the automatic transmission won't move. The key also won't turn in the ignition. Later on, when I correct all of that stuff, I find the battery is too low on juice to start the car. (I have since learned you should take your battery indoors with you, as the ultra cold temperatures radically lower your starting voltage.)
Well, with help, we rolled the car into the sunshine and opened the hood. Removed the battery and took it into the motel to thaw out. A couple hours later, reassembled everything, and thankfully, the car started.
As I drove across the Wyoming-Utah border, the temperature climbed above zero.
Wes Wada Bend, Oregon
-- JIMMY D. MOORE
Outdoor Humor Writer. Author of "MOON HOLLER MISFITS" Member Texas Outdoor Writers Association
FFF,VFB, FFW, HCFF, Texas Fish & Game, Sporting Tales,Scout Exec. BSA-Ret.VP Chapter Affairs GRTU,
Owner/Webmaster - Worldwide Flyfishing Info. http://www.BIGTROUTMAN.homestead.com/MainPage.html
"Being able to read trout streams is just as valuable to a fly fisherman as the ability to read a defense is to a Quarterback."
Jimmy D. Moore
