Adventures in Parenting - Crappy Roads Edition

Saturday, February 5, 2011
As I've mentioned before, last month my Hot Daughter moved back into the Big Yellow House. Part of the plan for this move was an obligation on her part to finally learn to drive so that she can get herself around on her own. Since she's a full time student who also works four days a week, she has a lot of places she needs to be, and while I love my Hot Daughter and want her to be successful, I wasn't really down with the idea of chauffeuring a college sophomore indefinitely.

So we've been practicing since December, in preparation for her driver's test. Since I'm going to be out of town next week (and thus not available for chauffeur duty), she decided to take her driver's test today from one of our local driver's school. She made her appointment, and of course, it started to snow four hours before the test. By the time we got there, it was snowing harder, but the roads were mostly just wet. In the twenty minutes it took for her and the tester to leave for the test, it was snowing much, much harder, and the roads were crap.

But she bit the bullet, went out in the Hooptie, and passed her test. She said that she was surprised that she passed because there was a number of times when the wheels were spinning and the car was sliding.

I told her that not everyone could take their driving test on crappy roads after only two months of practice and pass it. So from now on we would refer to her "Ms. McAwesome."

That's my girl.

8 comments:

Stacey said...

That apple doesn't fall far, me thinks.

Anne C. said...

Congrats to the Smart Ms. McA!
I barely passed my test (driving my parents' Grand Caravan), back in the stone ages, but I passed. They don't give grades for the driving test, so that's what counts, then and now. :)

Nathan said...

I wanna throw in my congrats too. But I can't get over the fact that someone grew up in a place without mass transit and never learned to drive before.

I'm pretty sure I learned how to drive when I was 14.

Ah well.

Random Michelle K said...

CONGRATULATIONS!

That's AWESOME!

My advice for learning how to handle a car in the snow: wait for a night with an inch or so of snow. Find an empty parking lot. Do doughnuts. In learning how to get the car to spin out, you also learn what causes a spin out, what a car does when it spins out, and how to deal with it.

Plus? SO FUN!

Nathan, my friend Susan has never learned to drive (and the same holds for her daughter), and my sister-in-law's brother refuses to drive, even though he has a license.

So people don't like to drive.

I am not one of those people.

eldicag = is this Welsh? If so, that's totally Eric's fault.

Janiece said...

Nathan, she had her own reasons for not learning sooner, but now that her circumstances have changed, those reasons no longer apply. While the South Metro area doesn't have a great deal to offer in the way of public transportation, I can assure you she had its use down to a science.

kimby said...

This non driver is tipping her hat to Ms McA!! Way to go!

Carol Elaine said...

Congrats to Hot Daughter!

Nathan, I'm not a fan of driving (unless the roads are clear of other drivers - which is highly unlikely in L.A.) and I didn't get my license until I was 23. Not to mention my recent seven years sans auto.

I can totally understand not wanting to have a license/car unless it's absolutely necessary, even with inefficient public transportation.

WendyB_09 said...

A girl after my own heart. Took my very first driving lesson in a high school driving class on several inches of packed ice and snow. I was the only one that didn't put the car into a skid that paniced the teacher.