For the most part, college has been great, not too memorable, but nice. I work on campus at the IT support center, I am doing well in all of my classes. I have made some friends. I play rugby.
But the excitement started on Tuesday, November 23, 2010, when I attempted to come home from Thanksgiving. The original plan was to attend morning classes, and then skip out and drive home, bringing my friend Christian with me, and picking up Holly in Ellensburg along the way. However, I was a little worried about my car, since it had been snowing for a week and was -7 and my car is pretty weak to begin with. So I checked everything the night before; started the engine, ran it for a few, checked my chains and other supplies, and was finally at peace.
Then, on Tuesday morning, right after my 8AM class, I go out to my car to warm up the engine, turn the key, clamp the wires (because about a month before that my car's ignition died and so now I have to hotwire it to start it), and...nothing. No spark, no sound, no movement, nothing. So, like I do with everything else, I panicked. Christian came over and we plugged in my car's engine block heater, waited a few hours, and nothing. We called my father who had said that the engine had frozen. So we spend an hour dumping boiling water over my car's engine, only to have my dad call and tell us to go to the Greyhound station. "The bus leaves at 3:15" "But we were warming up the engine" "I said 'Frozen' as in 'Junkyard Frozen'. It's dead." "Why couldn't you explain that an hour ago? It's -7 here, I though you meant 'COLD FROZEN'" "Oh well, the battery might be dead" "What? Um...ok. I will call you back, dad." Then Christian remembers that he has AAA, so they come out and take a look, where they told us we were hosed. Thanks, Mr. AAA man.
So at about 2:00, Christian and I get a ride from a boy in my dorm to the Greyhound station. It's packed. We get in the ridiculously long line, and pray that the other people here are NOT going to Seattle. They are. After 20 minutes of not moving, and man at the front of the line exclaims how Seattle is sold out and the next available bus is 8:45 AM Wednesday. No thanks! I called Dad, who said to get to the airport ASAP, and that my grandma was buying us the last two seats on the plane as we speak. The man behind us in line, who was very nice and kept saying how this whole scenario was like Planes, Trains, and Automobiles, suggested that we all split a cab to the airport. Great! Christian calls for a cab. Moments before the cab pulls up, two women come over and ask if they can get a ride to the airport as well. Sure. Why not? So the 5 of us get in the cab/minivan. And go to the airport. About 10 miles. $5 each. Yeah. Christian and I get to the airport, pass the ungodly TSA, and wait for four and a half hours for our flight, which, thankfully, was the only flight on time. We made it home about 8:30 that night, after a 37 minute, $145 flight home. EEK!
But what about Holly? I was supposed to pick her up in Ellensburg, but obviously that did not happen. So once we realized that we were not going to make it in my little car of death, my father purchased Holly a Greyhound bus ticket online from Ellensburg to Seattle. Phew, that was a close one. So Holly simply called a cab to take her to the station and she was set. That is until the cabbie calls her back, informing her that due to the massive amounts of snow, the Geryhound station was not sending out any more buses that day. Thankfully, however, the cab company offers a shuttle to SeaTac airport, so Holly hopped on the shuttle and made it home by about 7:45. Still, it was one crazy day.
So that is my first great American college adventure. Stay tuned for more. Because believe me, there WILL be more.
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