Sunday, February 07, 2010

The joys of winter.

Well. Yesterday the husbeast spent most of the morning digging out his Suburban. And yesterday afternoon, the property management company sent snow plows through the lots. So this morning, most of the rest of the tenants in the building emerged to dig out their cars, including the two feet of snow on the roofs of them. Around noon, the husbeast decided we'd put it off long enough and it was time to go free my Jeep. His plan was to hook a tow strap up to the Jeep, and pull it out of the snow with his Suburban.

While he was futzing around getting the Suburban out of its parking space, joking with the neighbors digging out their cars, and rummaging for tow straps, I waded through the nearly hip-deep snow (it was up past my knees, and I am not short), hopped in the Jeep, and started it up. Now, you see, there are different kinds of four wheel drive. There's "four high", which is high speed four wheel drive, for highway and regular street driving; it's good for occasional icy patches, or in heavy rain (I used it a lot in Charleston in the rain). Then there's "four low". That's the really low speed, high torque, crawling four wheel drive, that you use to climb out of ditches and over logs and stuff. While the Jeep was warming up, I looked down at my little shifter and pulled it into four low.

If he was pulling me out anyway, I might as well get stuck first.

I backed up a couple feet until the snow compressed and I couldn't go any further. Then I pulled forward as far as I could, and backed up again pushing more snow out of the way. After three or four repetitions of that, I thought "you know, I could probably tromp it and get out of here on my own". Except the husbeast was back there with his Suburban and his tow straps. So I leaned out the door and told him to get out of the way. He glared for a minute, and did.

After a few more rocks back and forth, and a little spinning, I backed myself out of the space, blasting snow in all directions. All the neighbors cheered. I waved my arms in the air like a prize fighter while we all laughed.

Working back and forth, I put the Jeep in and out of the space a couple more times, to make some space on either side so I could get in and out, then I parked the Jeep and headed back in. The husbeast was standing with the neighbors, glaring at me and pretending to be angry (the husbeast was glaring; the neighbors were amused). He looks at them, and says "I spent TWO AND A HALF HOURS digging out my Suburban yesterday. Then SHE comes out and is all" here he shifted into a high voice and waved his arms around "I'm gonna back my Jeep right out! Heehee!" Then he glared at me some more. "Bitch."

I told him it was because I was wearing the magic pink boots. He doesn't seem convinced and would probably rather shovel for two and a half hours, if it came to it. Since getting back inside, he has grumbled some more, and muttered "bitch" a couple times.

Heh heh heh. Sometimes I really love winter.

12 comments:

Barbara said...

Nice. It was definitely the boots.

RC said...

Huzzah! and neen-er-neen-er too!

MagicChupacabra said...

The Husbeast just needs to learn that some times things like pink boots is all it takes.

Kinda like how when someone is 8 that they think adding flames to the side of an object makes it go faster.

:-D

Galad said...

Well, maybe pink boots AND four wheel drive. Way to go!

roxie said...

You Rule! Totally awesome!

Amy Lane said...

OMG! And I'm w/Barbara. DEFINITELY the boots!

Louiz said...

Woohoo!

Alwen said...

Go pink boots! Low gear is awesome with fudge awesome sauce!

(My DH was delivering a vehicle from station to station once when he located some black ice and found himself off the road. He said "I put it in creeper gear and WALKED it back on the road.")

Donna Lee said...

I am so thankful for the 4L on my car! We were 4 wheeling in the woods and came upon some young guys stuck. They were stuck because they didn't know how to drive in the snow. We pulled their (brand new) Ford Explorer truck out of the snow with my then 10 year old Isuzu rodeo. I loved it.

choperena said...

That is one of the main reasons I miss my Jeep (well, switch "snow" for "mud", since it doesn't actually snow south of the Tropic of Cancer). Also, parking ANYWHERE.

Unknown said...

Have I mentioned how much I love that you call your husband 'husbeast'? I have one of those myself!

Kathleen Dames said...

Just had to chime in on the "that's awesome" wagon. There are advantages to living in NYC - someone else has to take care of the snow :)