4:20am - Woke up
4:30am - Called Aya & Amy to see if we were REALLY going to do this
5:30am - Left town - roads were not-so-good just outside of town but got better as we went
8:00am - Stopped for breakfast
10:30am - Arrived in the cities
11:50am - Reached the other side of the cities - lots of snow and traffic at a stand-still in places
The afternoon drive through Wisconsin was spotty, but generally not that bad. We had snow, sleet, rain, hail... and variations of all the above.
5:00ish - We got almost to Wausau, WI (about 100 miles from our destination) and we hit blizzard-type weather... We stopped at an Applebee's so I could take a break from driving and we were hoping the weather would get better. Left Applebee's at 6:00pm and it took us over an hour to get 30 miles. I couldn't see the road for large periods of time, there were cars/trucks/vans in the ditch every 5 minutes... then I literally couldn't see anything because the road hadn't been plowed recently, the wind was blowing more snow across the road, we were headed into the driving snow, and an 18-wheeler that had JUST passed us was off the side of the road, jack-knifed and I declared "THAT'S IT! We're pulling off I can't see the freaking road and there's a sign for a hotel." And we did. Our guardian angels were DEFINITELY with us. I have never been so scared in my life. We made it to the hotel and I was shaking all over. We're in the room now making lots of phone calls to reschedule interviews, checking emails, checking weather and road conditions....
UGH!
I tried so hard to talk them out of this trip and I probably should have stayed at home, but I couldn't just drop out and make them go on their own... It sounds weird but if something had happened to them I would have felt so horrible.... and I knew I was risking my own neck... but for most of the trip it really wasn't that bad.... Just WI is freaking awful.
UGH! UGH! UGH!
Anywho... We're here. We're safe.
I am going to try and relax, take a hot shower and go to sleep. They'll both be running around the room but my adrenaline is starting to wear off and it has been a LONG freaking day.... Sleep is sounding so good right now.
We'll most likely be up at 4am tomorrow to check weather and road conditions. It could potentially take us up to 4 hours to get there.... but I'm seriously holding my ground if it's anything at all like it is now we're not going ANYWHERE. If they don't have jobs they can all come stay in my one-bedroom apt. At least we'll all be ALIVE.
That's what's important.