Winter Driving

I've lived in San Diego since I was seven. But I spent a year in Salt Lake city in 79-80, working as a copy machine repair tech. During the winter I got all the snow driving experience I ever wanted.

Some of it was fun, like learning how to break the back tires loose as I rounded a corner and slide just far enough to leave me on the new direction. But when I did with my wife in the car, her reaction was, "Cute. Don't ever do it again with me in the car." Yeah, she knew I was doing it for fun, she just didn't appreciate it. And of course I was only doing it deliberately when there was no immediate other traffic that I could hit if I slid too far.

But my most memorable experience was a call that took me up to Park City, a ski town north of Salt Lake. I got up there and was driving up the main drag towards the address of the call when I came to a fairly steep hill. The last snowfall had been a couple of days earlier, and when I saw the blanket of clean, unmarked snow on that entire hill, I said to myself, "Man, if the locals won't drive it, ain't no way I am," and went around.