Being on the road for my day job, I have to learn to be ok with change in my day. I can’t plan out every second of every day like I’d normally like to! Especially when I live in Wisconsin and our winters tend to not be so kind sometimes!

One Thursday winter morning, I started out my day with my normal routine; waking up at 4am, heading to the gym for my workout class, back to my house to shower, get ready for work and head out getting into my mobile office (my car). I had the whole day planned out, as I always did.

On my way to work I received a message stating “be careful out there, they are calling for an ice storm”. Not thinking too much of it, I kept driving towards the “big city”. I came over the hill, that I have been warned all too often, that the temperature drops fast and storms can act differently through that area. As I crested over the hill I was hit with a sheet of rain that instantly turned to ice on my windshield of my Mazda 3 car. I let off the gas and held on tight to the steering wheel. I made it through that very brief “ice storm” and thought to myself, “well that was quick”. I continued on to my meeting.

Once at the coffee shop, where I made a corner table my office for a few hours until my meeting, I finally looked at the weather app on my phone. I then realized that this might be a very long day.

After hopping on Facebook quick to see any weather status updates on the local news facebook pages, I quickly regretted even leaving the house that Thursday morning. This road closed, that road closed, black ice everywhere, DO NOT TRAVEL! Once I finally got through all of the posts, I knew that I would be staying at that said coffee shop all day and rescheduling my meetings for that day. Every single road that I could take to get back home was closed until further notice, due to the ice storm that was wreaking havoc in our area.

The moral of this story is, when mother nature throws you a curve ball and and you’re stranded at a coffee shop 45 minutes away from home, you have to roll with the punches.

I try to always be prepared when I leave my house, especially during the Wisconsin winter months. My parents always taught me to never leave without extra warm clothes, hats, gloves, winter boots and a blanket with you just in case you have car trouble. AND I’ll forever have my dads voice drilled into my head saying, “Katey NEVER drive with under a half a tank of gas especially in the winter!”

Having a day job that requires me to be on the road most of the day along with setting up my mobile “office” at coffee shops, I have taken “be prepared” one step further. I never leave the house without ALL of my work files with me, just in case I do get stranded somewhere and I have a lot of time on my hands to get caught up on projects.

So that’s why I’m totally fine with being stranded at a coffee shop in an ice storm… I came prepared and I have no worries. I’ll have enough work to keep me busy!

Always be prepared my friends! – Katey