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The plane was late getting into Minneapolis, and while we were taxiing in, I watched from my window as our next flight, to Moline, departed without us. We spent the night at the airport, and the next morning I was in line to get us on the earliest flight. But the weather seemed to be worsening by the minute, and I was now beginning to worry that I wouldn’t get to Columbus in time.

Screw Moline, I thought, and screw whatever Elaine was going to do for Monte.

We booked a flight to Columbus, but the snow was falling heavily. The TVs in the airport blared news of the approaching storm.

Finally, we boarded the plane to Columbus only to sit on the tarmac for three and a half hours as workers deiced the plane and the pilots waited for a break in the bad weather. After another hour, the head pilot’s voice came over the intercom and told us the storm was just too strong. Then the pilot pulled the plane back into the terminal.

I wasn’t in a good mood. At the counter, the attendant told me she’d booked a new flight for us, this one from Minneapolis to Chicago, then to Philadelphia, then back to Detroit, and finally to Columbus.

I looked at her as if she were crazy. “How in the hell can you say you’ll fly me to four different cities when you can’t fly me to one right now?”

I asked for our luggage back and told Elaine to go to the rental car agency. While we’d been on the tarmac, she’d already called to rent a vehicle with four-wheel drive and a GPS.

We were talking about 650 miles to Columbus, so there wasn’t a minute to waste. By the time we had the rental keys, our luggage was still on the plane, so we took off without it. Of course, we got a call thirty minutes into the drive. Our luggage was available, so I went back for it. By now, we were in the heart of a blizzard.

We called Monte, who told us he’d also be driving to UFC 68 and that the weather was fine where he was, so we headed south toward him and the great state of Iowa.

At first, we shared the highway with snowplows. After a while, all I could see was our car and white. We were the only ones stupid enough to be out. I could barely see five feet in front of me as snow whisked past the windshield. It looked like we were hitting warp speed in Star Trek.

When we made it to the bottom of Minnesota, we may as well have arrived at the end of the world. Highway patrol had closed the interstate, and there was nowhere left to go. Elaine and I pulled in to a truck stop, which had a convenience store, gas, and a Wendy’s.

I was getting more and more irate at the thought that I might miss the show. I called UFC coordinator Burt Watson and left a message. “We’re stuck at the end of the fucking Earth and trying to make our way to Columbus.”

Elaine was waiting in line at the Wendy’s counter when I walked in. She started laughing, which struck me as odd, and told me to look at the guy flipping the burgers. I turned around and saw the clone of one of my favorite movie characters, Fat Bastard. This guy had to be five feet four at most and 380 pounds at least with huge red chops running down the sides of his face. If I weren’t so mad about getting stuck at this twilight zone gas stop, I would’ve laughed.

With the highways closing all around us, Elaine asked some truckers if they knew of any roads that would be open heading toward Iowa. They gave us a new route to take but said the roads would probably be a mess.

We had no other options. We had to keep moving.

When I couldn’t see the road in front of me anymore, I started to follow the light poles as a guide. I was hauling ass because I didn’t want to get stuck. Cars were abandoned in ditches off to the side. I felt bad because I was taking my wife’s life into my own hands, and I apologized for getting her into this mess.

I drove through the night. Everything had turned white: the roads, the sky, the car, my knuckles.

I don’t know how we did it, but we made it to Moline. I dropped off the rental car at the airport, and Monte picked us up and drove us the rest of the way so I could get some rest.

We arrived in