Ed, my stepdad in the Peoria area (downstate from Chicago) and my mom have a place in the country with a nice paved driveway. He even has one of those mini-bulldozers to plow his drive. But when the big snows come, the county snowplows leave a ridge of frozen, filthy snow that has the folks locked on their land for now.

The tracks in the snow here are as far as the ol’ Jeep Grand Cherokee could make it, apparently.