Tip: Want to be the proud sitelord of a blogger who would buy a premium theme? QUIT JERKING YOUR FUCKING CUSTOMERS AROUND!!!
Happy Picture Day Wednesday everybody… and if my site stats are to be believed, today’s Polaroid campfire story will be the 1,000th post to ever appear on Evil Squirrel’s Nest! 
Nevermind that a small handful of those 999 posts I “wrote” are reblogs… but WordPress totally believes in the power of plagiarism, so I can now take credit for all of the hard work you put into something I decided to share! Isn’t “social media” so much fun?
Now close your eyes and clear your mind of any and all thoughts… especially the Stay Puft Marshmallow Man. OK, are you ready? I want you to picture Oklahoma. You know, the state that inspired the musical…. OOOOOOOOOOOKlahoma, where the wind comes sweeping down the plain? Got a mental picture of the Native American state? Good! Does it look like this?
That must have been some wind…
Sunday March 2, 2014 was supposed to be the day I spent traveling back up I-44 from my annual message board meetup in Norman, Oklahoma to my nest sweet nest on the other side of St. Louis. Unfortunately, Mother Nature decided that Oklahoma needed to be punished with a massive, late season winter storm that spawned dangerous freezing rain Saturday night, dumped several inches of snow on top of it throughout the day Sunday, and added further misery to the situation with post-storm temperatures in the single digits (Fahrenheit, folks!), very unseasonably cold for the area. Being essentially snowed in at a hotel delaying my trek back home was not exactly how I wished to burn a valuable vacation day.
Me and you, brother.
What brought my frustration to a boil, however, was the half-assed, pathetic, “aw it’ll melt sometime before April” approach to ice and snow removal that the state and local departments of transportation took to getting the roads cleared. I had always been one of those hardened northerners who’d roll my eyes when one of those wild-eyed southreners would wear their irrational snowaphobia like a badge of pride. But to actually get stranded an extra day BECAUSE the locals apparently don’t care to drop salt and plow roads infuriated me to no end. When I finally left for home late, late Sunday night, 24 hours after the storm first hit… the interstate roads in Oklahoma were still not deemed safe for travel, and probably wouldn’t be for several days yet.
The governor recommends you stay home and make French toast until Summer.
But I said, “FUCK THIS!” Fuck Oklahoma and fuck the states that don’t want to take responsibility for keeping their roads maintained during winter weather because they’d rather spend the taxpayer money on cheap hookers. I drove home anyway. I got stuck behind a team of snowplows about 30 miles outside of Oklahoma City doing 30 miles per hour for almost an entire hour. And a shitty job they were doing at that of clearing the snow that had now been on the highway for almost 24 hours. Amazingly, almost like someone had waved a magic wand, when I finally made it to the Missouri border guess what! The roads turned from a slushy, frozen mess to almost completely clear of any trace of winter precipitation! I was actually able to drive the speed limit for most of the remaining 300 miles of my drive thanks to a state that can get its priorities straight!
Baby you’re much too fast.
Interestingly enough, despite it being a Sunday and despite all of the Okies on hunker down status… I was able to sneak a slippery drive over to my favorite Whataburger for something to eat besides whatever the previous guest left in the hotel room icebox. Keep that in mind the next time you plan a milk, bread and egg run… fast food NEVER closes.
He walked 10 miles in the snow uphill both ways just to deliver you a piping hot Whopper.
I’ll dig out from under all of the profanity and bitterness of my milestone post to come up with something better next week…
Evil Squirrel's Nest 
Oh I hate that… my dad gave some guy an asskick who said: we were surprised by the snow… yes in the bavarian alpes snow in december is SURE a surprise… I’m glad you found the way home… to buy a burger was a great idea … breadcrumbs can work like roadsalt sometimes …
I’d bet a lot of the “food” they sell at McDonalds would be great for clearing the roads… or at least laying down a drivable surface!
Yay, congratulations on hitting four figures!
I got as far as reading “Now close your eyes” in your post and then it all went black! So I ignored you, opened my eyes again and kept on reading. Ha ha.
Cute squirrel 🙂
I guess I didn’t think those instructions out very carefully, did I? I hope nobody’s still got their eyes shut and awaiting further instruction…
I’m surprised actually. I thought the one thing you can count on in a state where it snows most winters is good snow clearing. I mean, hell, we have plenty of corrupt, inept, stupid pols here … but they clear the road quickly or as quickly as possible. That’s actually pretty weird.
That’s the problem with Oklahoma… even though they get their share of snow (Probably as much as we do 500 miles northeast), they apparently have the mindset that they’re either a southern or southwestern state that doesn’t need to worry about snow removal since it never snows! Oddly enough, the centerpiece of my annual trip down there is a political satire comedy/musical show put on by a group of current and ex-media members one of my friends belongs to… maybe the Oklahoma Snowmageddon should have been a part of the next year’s show.
Even on the sunny shores of the Pacific Ocean we know how to clear our roads when it snows. They even have CHP escorts when the fog gets bad. Granted we have the crappiest and most pot hole filled roads in the country, but that is another sad pathetic story…
But holy squirrel shit, it is not OK to not get out the snow plows and clear the roads in OK.
There is nothing like having Ponch and Jon lead the way for you to get to work in the morning…
The potholes remind me of when I went to Texas a couple years ago via Arkansas. As soon as I crossed the border from Missouri into Meccaland, the roads deteriorated into crap that reminded me of when the old streetcar tracks were coming through the pavement in my city when I was younger. Also, almost every rest stop in Arkansas was closed when I went through. I’ll bet they don’t do snow removal either…
Fuck it!!! Yeah!! That’s right!! Fuck you snow and creepy BK!!
Yeah! Wait I like the Burger King guy. I think he’s kind of sexy.
Really? He creeps me out.
He knows how to grill my burgers. One side only. Um, wait – yeah he’s creepy.
See? Stop smiling, bitch!
Still, he beats Ronald.
Hmm. I suppose so.
I like Whoppers better than Big Macs.
I can handle both at the same time.
So you’re into both Whoppers AND Big Macs?
When I can’t decide what kind of buns I want, yes.
I stick with sesame seed buns like any proper girl would do!
Ya gotta live a little, try different kinds of beef!
Pretty sure I do in every burger at Burger King.
All I can say is, ALL DAY BREAKFAST.
Burger King pissed me off last year when they discontinued their chicken strips… so they can absolutely go get themselves fucked! They have some damn good fries, though…
Wow 1 K posts. I think I went over 500 a while back – or was it more . . . I forget. Either we are impressive writers or we just have nothing much else to do but play with toys and write goofy stuff (which more people should do instead of getting into dangerous occupations like politician).
Anyway, I live in Texas and I’m actually closer to Oklahoma than I am to other parts of Texas. We are big enough that we literally have several different climates. We’ve gotten tons of snow here before and they rarely cancel school or work, except for the last blizzard where even the fast food places were shut down. Except for one. Even Wal-Mart was closed. It wasn’t even that bad. People in Dallas, though, freak out because the only snow they know of is what most people call slush. Wimps.
When Mecca closes, the snow has officially gotten out of hand. Or maybe they just sold out of bread, milk, eggs and snow shovels and just said fuck it….
I sometimes wonder if grocery stores don’t pay off weather men to say it’s the storm of the century so they can sell more stuff. I mean honestly I have never heard of anyone around here being snowed in for more than a day or two. You don’t need the entire store, people.
I think weathermen do that to cover their asses. The complaints are louder when the snow is worse than predicted rather than less than the forecast. Knowing a bit about the field, I can couch for winter weather being nearly impossible to accurately predict because snowfall totals can be so fickle…
I pictured the flatness and lack of greenery in OK but I didn’t picture the snow! I was thinking more along the lines of something melting in the hot sun.
That squirrel with the snow on its nose is so adorable! As much of a wimp as I am about driving in ice and snow, the thought of my little squirrel friends cold and looking for food in the snow would have made me jump in my car to hit the icy freeway like you did.
I’ve only been to Oklahoma in the late winter… I can’t imagine what it feels like there in summer. Hot, humid and massive, city-eating tornadoes… I think I’ll stay home.
That’s my favorite winter weather squirrel picture! The look on his poor, snow covered face is like, “Gee… isn’t it almost Spring yet?”
Congrats on hitting 4 digits here on this delightful, informative blog. Squirrels everywhere are in awe of your nutty accomplishment. Long live the Nest.
The way they were running around this morning when I got home, I can totally believe they were. If it had actually been sunny, I might have gotten some nice pictures…
Here in CA, they will just close the freeways through the mountain passes when it snows. Either that or you’re required to put chains on. Chains! Have you people never heard of salt? Ridiculous.
Congrats on your comma!
Yeah, those chains will help your car plow through that 18 inch snowdrift!
Thanks… and now I look forward to getting my second comma! Only 999,000 more posts to go!
Bah, that’s like what fell on my house in the first few hours in Friday
I heard you guys got a few flurries…
I fucking hate winter in the Midwest.
The extreme seasons in the Midwest are both shit. Spring and Fall is the only way to go…
Amen brother!
Congrats! Snow makes me want to hibernate.
That squirrel with the snow on his nose would like to join you in hiding…
Being from the south, I can relate how people want to shut down everything with a single snow flake let alone a snow blizzard. Thank goodness I traded in the Smart car for 4X4 Jeep – it might actually be needed this year. Stay strong my evil friend. XOXO – Bacon
OMG! I had no idea Albert was no longer with you! My little Neon is like a bulldozer in the snow… small cars kick butt!
Yeah. Albert was sold mid part of last year. He had no shocks so you felt every little bump in the road – even a penny dad said. He was bugging mom’s arthritis in her hips so mom traded up to the Jeep. XOXO – Bacon
When I was a kid we lived in Tulsa,OK. It snowed and left a quarter inch. School was closed. My dad still went into work in the 60’s something Ford pick up with bald tires. He saw people sliding all over the place. He only had trouble trying to get up a small hill. He grew up in Nebraska not the great white north but we know what a winter storm looks like. 🙂
I can understand the situation in places where it may go many years without snowing (Like, oh, New Orleans), but I’ve never pictured Oklahoma that way. The Plains states are like a giant funnel pulling down all that cold and snow from Canada every winter. At the very least, I know Oklahoma is in the ice storm belt and should know to keep salt around!
exactly!
you think you have it bad? In Canada, it’s not the drivers..http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/nova-scotia/squirrel-power-outage-1.3424462
Eh, squirrels are causing power outages all the time. There’s more inefficiency for you… above ground power lines!
I had to google The Stay Puft Guy and wow! He is creepy. I think he was in the original ghostbusters. Everything makes sense now! (NOT) All know about snow is that it doesnt here. ❤
I hate to say it, but it is no better here. We got just under an inch of snow and then a hard freeze that night and we had to stay home for a day and a half while it melted. We don’t get the benefits of snow plows and salt out here. They just tell us to “stay home”. Yet, I know that Huntsville’s streets were cleared and the highway was too. Ah well, I can’t complain too much. At least it was over the weekend and it wasn’t too boring around here. 😉
You touched on something else that drives me mad! When it snows on the weekend! Even the TV stations up north feel like they must devote team coverage to a snowstorm… and when it happens during rush hour, they advise people to leave early and take their time driving on the slippery roads. When it snows on the weekend, they instead just tell people to stay home. Nevermind all of us in the workforce who have employment obligations on weekends… and nights even! I drove to work on a Sunday night once after a 12 inch snowstorm!
YIKES! Glad you made it safely!
It isn’t half frustrating when they get surprised at the weather. I mean, we have the met office and everything these days…