Hi, @physicsfita,
I am sympathetic to your concern as my two greatest concerns about purchasing Model S were (a) winter performance of a very powerful rear-wheel drive car and (b) long-distance trips. The answer to (a) was Nokiian Hakkapolita R2 snow tires, with which I have observed quite good performance on snow, ice and slush. The answer to (b), IMHO, is asking and answering the question, "what is your use case?"
If you are going to be making frequent long trips of erratic destination and duration and with little spare time for unpredictable amounts of charging, you may well be better off with a hybrid such as the Volt.
On the other hand, if the bulk of your driving is within a 100 mile radius of your home, a 85kwh Model S should do just fine. You'll charge up to 235 or 265 miles of range every night and make it home just fine. No worries about charging elsewhere during the day.
For longer trips, I have found that a little bit of planning works just fine, especially if you are traveling major highways. For instance, my wife suddenly decided to go to a regional environmental conference in Long Island over the weekend. A quick peek at Google Maps showed that she could hit the Milford, CT Supercharger along the way. Suddenly, the whole trip was easy as pie. She was able to drive 65-75 mph the whole way, charge at Milford for 15 minutes, catch the ferry over to Long Island (from Bridgeport), roam around LI, and then reverse the trip the next day.
Many (most?) of us are NOT putting in the level of planning described elsewhere on the forum.
At the end of the day, it all comes down to TIME. You'll probably never run out of juice if you are a responsible driver, just like you never run out of gas. But refill time for gas is 5 minutes, while refill time for Model S ranges from a few minutes (Supercharger, partial charge) to an hour (Supercharger, full charge of an empty battery) to a few hours or overnight (40A, partial or wholly empty battery) to two days (120V/15A circuit, empty battery).
After 10,000 miles of local, intrastate and inter-state driving, I am very happy with my Model S. I last visited a gas station on August 7, 2013. I have used public as well as private chargers, Superchargers and once -- only ONCE! -- found myself in "the wilds" looking to accumulate some extra charge as a buffer before returning home. A nearby RV park solved that problem for me.
So... what's your use case?
Alan
P.S. My other car is a 2013 Prius v wagon. We've had a 2004 Prius and a 2010 Prius as well. They have been great cars. But after living with Model S, I confess that I just HATE getting back into a Prius.
After reading through this thread, as a prospective future buyer of a Model E and a road trip enthusiast, I'm now thinking that I might be better off getting a Volt. It seems like too much hassle to have to McGyver up every conceivable adapter for every conceivable emergency scenario and have to use advanced computer simulation software planning my trip just to make sure I won't get stranded anywhere. This thread has brought up memories of a time that my fuel level got very low in a rough part of Detroit late at night coming back from a trip, due to me misestimating how much gas I had left in the tank. At least I was able to find a well-lit station, pay at the pump, put in a few gallons, and get the heck out of there.