Again, here in the northern half of the U.S. of A, snow happens, and sometimes, snow happens big.  It's important to not only have appropriate maintenance done on your vehicle, such as engine coolant flushes or transmission fluid changes, it is also important to equip your trunk with a snow survival kit.  The following is a list of what I feel you should keep in your trunk during the winter time:

 

Kitty Litter - sounds funny, but the litter plays 2 roles.  1. if your vehicle is 4WD, it helps weigh down the back of your car which helps with traction.  2. if you should get stuck in the snow or perhaps on ice, you can throw some kitty litter in front of your tires which helps them find traction and potentially get you unstuck.

 

Flares - dangerous, but if you drive off into a forest and find yourself in a scene from the movie "Alive", you may want some fireworks to shoot in the air to speed up the search process.

 

Blanket - if your car breaks down on a lonesome country road, its nice to have your snuggie with you to keep warm.

 

Scissors - this is sad but very important.  Always keep a pair of scissors in your glove compartment.  Should you be in a crash and your vehicle turns upside down or on it's side, you may need to cut your seat belt off to get out.  Hopefully you'll never use them, but important to have just in case.

 

Lock De-Icer - but DO NOT KEEP IN YOUR CAR.  How stupid do you think you would feel if your locks are frozen, and your lock de-icer is locked inside your car.

 

Lastly, and something I would recommend you actually NOT buy is a bottle of fuel de-icer, such as Heat (spelled with 2 e's but I don't want to discriminate)  Now that you live in the future, gasoline has ethanol which is an alcohol that prevents gas line freezing.  This eliminates the need for any on the shelf fuel additive used to clear up frozen gas lines.

 

Part III coming soon, it gets much more interesting, I swear!