Category Archives: Travels & Tribulations

Fast & Furious: Swedish Drift


It took a moment of contemplation before diving into this little snow drift.

One week after a major snowstorm and 15-20% of the street parking in Hoboken remains under sooty iceburgs. Plowing was haphazard and there’s huge drifts next to driveways and pedestrian crossings. It makes it next to impossible to see around intersections at stop signs.

I witnessed a hit and run on Thursday. The driver of a big, red dump truck was so pissed at the slow traffic flow along Washington St. that he backed his truck into a passenger van parked in front of the local Elks lodge. The rear of the van was sticking out a bit into the lane and a Miller Lite truck was double parked across the street. This caused a pinch-point that slowed down traffic for 4-5 blocks. The guy in the dump truck kept blaring his horn, to no avail. When he finally squeezed through he stopped, hit reverse, and slowly backed into the senior-center van that was partially blocking the lane. He pushed it enough to move it, and luckily there was no one inside. He then took off, only to get stuck in the next traffic tie up. Cops drove to the scene about 10 minutes later, but I was already on a slow moving bus to downtown.

Below is a spot I managed to parallel park into in front of my place. I’d just driven 2.5 hours and was determined to fit, so I just plowed back and hoped not to clog the tail pipe with an icicle.

Snowed In and Dug Out

snowkids

The Great Thunder Snow Storm of Dec 2010 has covered our street with at least a foot of snow. As of Monday night our street hasn’t been plowed, 18 hours after the snow stopped. This has resulted in a 1/2 dozen idiots in CUVs thinking they can use our block as a cross-street, only to find their compact-car-based, tall,  AWD with fat street tires ain’t gonna make it through the mush. A guy in a BMW X3 caused a minor traffic jam when he got stuck with 3 cars behind him. 15 minutes of spinning and pushing and he finally started moving. 10 yards later and he was stuck again, requiring another 15 minutes of spinning and pushing. The cars behind couldn’t go backward so they sat there. A food delivery guy in an old Nissan gave up on his delivery and was chowing down on some lo mein. Once the beemer got out the Nissan was able to skate across the snow, benefiting from low weight and skinny tires.

I don’t need to drive anywhere til Wednesday but figured I’d shovel out so things don’t freeze. Above my daughters stand on a snow-drift next to my car. I had shoveled a bit the night before but there was plenty more overnight. Below is a couple hours later, with salt under the tires, a snow-berm to protect against fishtailers, and a tunnel near the front of the car so the kids can crawl through to the sidewalk.

snow-shoveled

My Jump-Started Week

battery-oldThree circumstances worked against me this week:

1. Cold weather in NJ.

2. Oily alternator belt.

3. Ye olde battery.

I needed a jump start twice. The first was from parking in front of my apartment with the hazards on. I was away from the car for only 20 minutes and it wouldn’t start up. I looked under the hood at the Volvo logo on the battery and figured it was probably an 18 year old original. After losing the charge when I moved my car for a street sweeper, I figured I needed a new battery. Got a $100 Bosch at Pep Boys and now we start like a champ.

battery-new

You Can Ride in the Trunk

I’ve been doing road trips to camps all summer. This week is gymnastics in Paramus, so I’ve been piling 5 girls into the brick for the 25 mile trip. The 3rd seat is nice in that it doesn’t require a booster seat; the belt is low enough that it fits 5 and 6 year olds. When I tell the kids they’re going to have to ride in the trunk they laugh and laugh.

Claire is thrilled to sit in the front passenger seat, but the Jonas Brothers are never loud enough. Sigh. Is it too much to wish to have my daughters grow up to be Mastodon fans?

Top Heavy Camper

myblackbrick-camping
Went camping at Covered Bridge campsite in the Catskills this weekend and somehow my buddy David managed to shoot a pic of us tooling around the curvy roads along the river without wrecking his SUV.

I was luck enough to have a neighbor of my parents donate the roof bin they used to use on their 940. The Sears “Ex-Cargo” was the same model my parents used to have on top of our 1979 Olds Delta 88 when we made trips to the beaches of North Carolina. It’s nice and tall and practically doubles the cargo area, enabling me to actually see out the back window with all our equipment.