Drive slow and get there in one piece

In case anyone has missed it, winter is here.

Like everyone else around, I spent much of the weekend shoveling my driveway only to wake up Monday morning to do it all over again. It seems like the snow gods are determined to make up — in just a few days time — for all the snow we didn't get in December.

Driving has been a bit interesting, with some drivers seeming to think it's June and they can accelerate in an instant and stop on command. Neither is true at the moment, as many of them are finding out to their dismay as they're sliding off the road, into other cars and landing in ditches.

Growing up in the Tri-Cities, I'm more used to sagebrush and 100-degree temperatures. Even the winters are pretty mild and you rarely get more than a couple of inches of snow on the ground for any period of time before a Chinook wind comes along and melts everything.

The key, I've learned, to driving in the winter can be condensed into two words — drive slow.

Big rigs four-wheel drive, snow tires — while they can be helpful — aren't the answer. Just ask any tow truck driver or law enforcement officer — after they pull you out of the ditch or talk to you in the aftermath of an accident.

The answer is pretty simple — drive slow.

I can hear you out there — "So you're the 'granny' whose rig I'm stuck behind. Grrrrr."

Maybe. But there's also someone ahead of me who is driving equally as slow and for the same reasons — the roads are terrible and we want to get there in one piece.

If you don't want to drive slow for yourself or for the sanity of the other drivers on the road — do it for your family. No one needs to hear that a loved one has been hurt or killed in a senseless, stupid accident that could have been prevented.

Just follow this one easy-to-remember tip — drive slow.

Caroline Lobsinger is the managing editor of the Daily Bee.