Here in Southern Appalachia, this record-breaking cold snap has done its level best to make our lives harder than they ought to be...

Yesterday, the cashier lady at the gas station commented to me, "This is the south. It ain't supposed to do this."

I fully agreed with her.

We've gone through more firewood per day over the past week than we ever have before. Each morning, I make six trips in and out with an armload of firewood, and each by the end of each night, it's all gone.

Our pipes froze five nights ago. This happens just about every winter, due to the fact that we live in a mobile home with only a thin layer of vinyl standing between the pipes and the frigid weather. But usually, it's not such a big deal. It freezes at night, and then thaws out the next day when the warm sunshine hits the frozen plumbing. Once in awhile, during particularly cold weather, it'll stay frozen for a day or two. We keep twenty gallons of water under the sink for flushing toilets when this happens, and always have a few gallons of drinking water in the kitchen, too.

But this is just ridiculous. Not only have we been five days and nights without running water, but it looks like we have at least another three days to go before the weather lets up on us a bit. Those twenty gallon jugs? I've already trekked to town to fill them up TWICE. The first time, I was able to fill them from the spigot at our nearest convenience store. But today, that spigot was frozen, too! So I had to go to a friend's house and fill up the bottles in her bathtub. (While I was there, I took a much-needed shower.)

Today, I washed an enormous pile of dirty dishes, using just three gallons of bottled water. As impressed as I am with my super rugged conservation skills, it's a bit of a letdown that the glasses seem to still have a thin film of soap on them. I couldn't keep the soapy water from contaminating the rinse water.

On New Year's Eve, I got stuck in the most insane winter traffic jam I've ever experienced. I'd left the house around 2 in the afternoon to pick up my daughter in Asheville. She'd been staying with a friend who lives in another sleepy rural community on the other side of Asheville from my sleepy rural community, and her mom and I always meet in the middle to exchange kiddos.

When I left the house, it was cold. It was really damn cold. But there had been no snow, and the weather report did not anticipate any precipitation. Half an hour later, it started misting. A fine, but persistent mist that quickly soaked the roads and then froze to a solid sheet of ice.

At this point, I know you northerners are making fun of me for freaking out about a little ice on the roads. That's fine. I'll remember that next time you come down here for summer vacation, have a heat stroke in 80 degree weather, and then ask me "What's a grit?"

Anyway, both I and the other mom got stuck in traffic jams caused by accidents on the highways. (Probably Floridians.) So, texting each other, we both decided it was too dangerous to continue on into Asheville. We each turned around and went back home.

Normally, it would have taken me 20 minutes to get home from where I turned around. Even driving slowly and carefully because of the ice, it should have taken 40 minutes, max.

But no. It took me TWO F'ING HOURS.

See, we'd had no warning about this. Everyone had been out and about, freezing their asses off, but feeling more or less secure in their ability to make it home that night, because the weather report had told us "Chance of Precipitation: 2%". So now everyone and their mamaw was out there slip-sliding on black ice, up and down steep mountain hills.

If you've never sat in a non-4WD vehicle on a steep hill in lurching, bumper-to-bumper traffic on black ice, then you have not truly plumbed the depths of human anxiety. And I wasn't the only one driving a Toyota sedan. Like I said, this black ice thing took the whole region by surprise. I saw more little compact cars and motorcycles than I could count, abandoned on the sides of the highway, their owners having wandered off to live in Waffle House until the roads cleared.

I was seriously considering joining them, until I had an epiphany.

What I needed was traction, and the highway provided.

I drove the rest of the way with my driver's side tires in the rumble strip. It was a jolting experience, to say the least, but mine was the only non-4WD vehicle not swerving all over the lanes. And I made it home safely.

The other mom? She was stuck on the highway for THREE HOURS, and hardly moved five miles in that whole time. She finally pulled off on an exit, took the kids to an Italian restaurant, and called her husband to come pick them up in his 4WD truck.

I keep saying, every winter, that I'm done with winter. I'm moving to someplace where the air doesn't hurt my face. BUT THIS TIME I AM SERIOUS!

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@lesliestarrohara