Friday, February 03, 2006

My Driving Needs Improvement

I'm the stay at home type of person, and to be honest, I can't remember when I last made it into town. My husband goes to town once or twice a week to run errands, so he just takes my grocery list and picks up what we need. This does get me into trouble at times, as my winter driving skills are more than a bit rusty.

It was suppertime by the time Paulette and I finished making two kinds of salve. She had invited Jim and the boys to have supper with us, so it was even later by the time we cleaned up and headed for home. Even though the days are gradually getting longer we still have rather short days up here by the Canadian border, so it was dark. I'm not crazy about driving in the dark -- especially in winter. The other stressor for me was the fact that our van's dashboard panel was letting me know that Jim had forgotten to fill up with gas the last time he was in town. I just wanted to get home ASAP before I ran out of gas!

I guess I must have been a bit distracted as 3 of the boys and I drove around a bend in Paulette's road, and took the corner too close to the right side -- immediately pulling me into a ditch area. The boys promptly told me this was the same spot that our friend Steve had gone in not too long ago when ploughing out the road with his Bobcat! Not a real comforting thought. Thankfully Jim was behind me in our station wagon, so he was there to help.

It took a lot longer than I expected to get the van out, but Jim did a good job. Hopefully I'll know better the next time I take that road. I guess I better do a bit more winter driving. By the way, I made it all the way home without running out of gas!

PS -- I have yet to figure out how to do links to other blogs, but I would like you to check out the latest entry by www.northernfarmer.blogspot.com . He has a way with words, and explains what our family feels about country living. The entry is called, "Simple Folks." I'm even starting to feel this way!

3 comments:

Tom Scepaniak said...

Lynn,
My blog has been acting strange lately. This morning I had a comment from you on a post. I had to do a tweek to the blog that required republishing the whole works and then your comment was lost. I don't know how that happened, but I thought I'd let you know. Thanks for your comment and kind words.

Christine said...

Winter driving can be tricky for even seasoned drivers! I'm glad no one was hurt and the van wasn't hurt!

Northern Farmer certainly does have a way with words!

How did the salve making go?

Lynn Bartlett said...

Salve making was great, nothing like learning from an expert. We made a new salve, from rose petals and calendula flowers, with a bit of comfrey and then oils. That one will be for sensitive skin, such as for a baby. The other is being tested by my son, made out of black walnut hulls. The recipe: take a bit of this, a bit of that -- so I can't even pass on the amounts to you!