I once had a Honda Civic hatch. When I bought it, I didn't realize it had snow tires on it. Then one day during the summer, I decided to take it in to the dealer to figure out why I was getting such vibration above 65-75 mph. Boy did I feel dumb when they told me I had snow tires on.
Anyway, I agree with frenchblueC2 _ unless you really, really have to go somewhere while it's actually snowing, just wait until morning when the plows do their thing, and you're on your way. Or have a wife that drives a Jeep Cherokee :-)
Unless you store your car from November to April, you're going to inevitably be exposed to salt, so just stop fretting now. Just zip through the car wash a few times a month, and you should be all right.
If you must drive in the snow, just go really, really slow. I've never had snow tires (in the winter, at least!), and I've nearly killed myself only a handful of times. But then again, I learned how to drive in the middle of the harsh winter of 1994, living on top of a steep hill, in my mother's '87 Buick LeSabre Estate Wagon (yeah, the huge beasts with rwd that you could fit 9 people in, with that sweet woodgrain paneling).
