ice

It takes time to scrape ice off your car's windshield. And who has this extra two minutes in the morning on a cold winter's day. Not me. I should mention that my car has never seen the inside of a garage. I park it in the front of my house outside.

So how does one scrape the ice off a windshield? You get in the car, put the defrost on full blast bend down and lean forward as much as you can in the driver's seat and tilt your head so you can look through the very bottom of the windshield at that 1/8 inch sliver of clear.

This is how lazy people drive in the midwest on a cold winter's day. And truth be told, I am one of those people.

Yesterday was cold. And of course I was running late in the morning because it's so hard to get out of a warm bed in the middle of the winter. Thus I had no time to scrape windows of my car. So I turned on the defrost, looked through the sliver and off I drove. But I'm having a very difficult time seeing through the sliver. I turn on the windshield wipers. Nothing.

Then I do the unthinkable. I pull back on the blinker light control and spray some water on the windshield while I'm driving. You would think I would know better! I have a literature degree from a 4 year college for heaven's sake!!

This brilliant move has now resulted in ANOTHER layer of ice on my already iced over windshield. I am blind. I cannot see whatsoever.

Remembering seeing a green parked car along the route before I became stupid, I knew I had to drive a little further to clear the parked car. And then I pulled over. Needless to say, I cannot see the curb but realized soon enough where it was once I hit it.

Now I have to physically get OUT of the car, find the scraper which I threw in the backseat last week and do what I should have done 5 minutes ago and start hacking away at the ice on my windshield.

I have a nice little circle going right in the middle of the driver's side of the windshield. It's FREEZING outside so I figure that was good enough.

Get back in the car, roll down the driver's window because that window is also frozen glossy from ice and I didn't scrape it, and merge into traffic. Roll the window back up and stare through my little circle. But I am leaning so far forward to see out that my body has begun to fog up the windshield.

You have GOT to be kidding!! I rub the inside of the windshield with my gloved hand. There, I can sorta see again. Kinda.

I've gone about 2 blocks now and I figure it's warm enough to try again with the jet spray of water. I shoot. I do not score.

I'm blind. AGAIN. I cannot see a thing. My little hole is closed now with ice as is my sliver below. The wipers are worthless. Stinking unbelievable.

Once again I have to pull my car over and again find the scraper and again go out in the cold and again scrape the windshield. This time I put some muscle behind it. The whole driver's side of the windshield is clear. Screw the other windows.

I get back in the car and take the winter scarf around my neck and put it up to my mouth. I do not want to fog the window from the inside.

She's off again. I resist the urge to jet spray the window with water. Call me dumb but I learned my lesson. I won't be doing that a third time.

Slowly but surely my car's windshield begins to defrost and I can lower the scarf from my mouth and sit back in the driver's seat.

I tell my husband about my adventure later that night at the dinner table and he calmly asks me "Why didn't you start the car with the remote starter you have on your keychain before you went outside this morning and let it warm up?"

Ohhhhh yeahhhhh rightttttt. But again, that would take 2 minutes and who has that time in the morning???

Note to self: Change the alarm clock setting by two minutes. But just for the winter months.