Laugh of the day

[amanda_lodden]

As you may have noticed, SE Michigan has been covered in snow again (is it spring yet? How 'bout now?). As it typical of our "is it spring yet?" snows, it's the wet, dense snow that just refuses to move and weighs approximately 5 tons per cubic inch.

John parked in the driveway yesterday, because we weren't expecting the snow until Tuesday. That, apparently, is the price for not checking the weather forecast every 15 minutes.

Riding in with John this morning (I'm killing time until I pick up my car from the repair shop), he stopped at a light. The snow on top of his car did not. A strip about three inches high slid down onto the front windshield. A second or so later, the snow that was being held back by that front strip also slid down the windshield, and then a second or so after that, a third layer slid down until the windshield was completely covered. The windshield wipers couldn't handle the load and refused to move. The light turned green. John rolled down his window and cleaned off the edge he could reach, which didn't do enough. The car behind us honked. The light turned yellow. John sighed, flipped on his hazard lights, and grabbed the scraper. The light turned red. John got out and "brushed" off his side (which implies that the snow moved, which it did not. It was more like shoveling the snow off with an implement not designed for such actions). John got back in and turned on the windshield wipers again. They moved about a half of an inch before groaning and going back down. I took the scraper and got out. I shoveled off my side. John turned the wipers on again. The wipers cleared the rest of the snow. I got back into the car. The snow that was left on the roof gave way, and covered the windshield again.

Comments

[roseneko.livejournal.com]

I totally hear you. A couple months back I ended up driving my little two-wheel-drive-no-snow-tires compact through whiteout conditions on the major highway here in town, and my windshield wipers iced up so badly that I had to turn on my hazard lights and stop in the middle of the highway to clear them off (if I'd pulled off to the shoulder I would've been stuck in a snowdrift). Let's just say, I was glad I was wearing my bright red coat.

The best indicator of how bad the weather was? When I stopped, the cars in the lane behind me stopped too, and waited until I was done and continued following me. It was that bloody hard to see where you were going.

[allanh.livejournal.com]

Growing up in Chicago, I learned a number of tricks for dealing with snowy weather and cars.

1. Fastest and easiest way to defrost/deice a windshield in the morning: Pour cool (not hot!) water over the windshield and windows. As long as the water temperature is above 32 degress F., it'll work beautifully.

2. Before starting out, brush off the entire top of the car. Even though I live in California, since I occasionally drive to snowy places I keep a large window squeegee in the trunk. The squeege doubles very handily as a snow-clearer. :)

3. Allocate at least 10-15 minutes of pouring and scraping time before each trip where the car will be sitting outside.

4. Rain-X'ing your windshield every few months not only provides better visibility during rainstorms, it makes snow a lot easier to clear off.

FWIW.

[roseneko.livejournal.com]

I may have to try the cool water trick sometime. Although I'm concerned that if I try that in Fairbanks (where winter weather often reaches 40 below and further) it'd just immediately re-freeze. Fortunately I live in Southeast Alaska, where it's not usually quite that cold. :)

[allanh.livejournal.com]

I've never tried this in an environment quite that cold. My suspicion is that if you've Rain-X'd the windshield, the water will sheet off quickly enough to not refreeze. :)

[roseneko.livejournal.com]

A good point, and one that would probably work in Fairbanks. (Problem with Rain-Xing in Juneau? It Never. Stops. Raining. So unless you have a garage you're pretty much SOL. :D)

[allanh.livejournal.com]

A very good point. You would need to find a way to keep the car dry for a couple of hours for Rain-X'ing purposes. If the windshield's not 100% dry when you put on the Rain-X, it won't work. :(

On the other hand, once you put on the Rain-X, it's usually good for 3-6 months, depending upon the environment. (In Alaska, that probably skews towards the 3-month mark.)

[roseneko.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I've used Rain-X before and been quite impressed with it (although it definitely skews toward the three-month mark in terms of useful lifespan). But we get so few sunny days here that we're usually out doing things during said days rather than staying at home applying Rain-X. Ah well. :)

[estarsign.livejournal.com]

Doh. The worst thing that tends to happen to me is that the snow I leave on the car (I don't like to take it off the car - the brushes tend to scratch paint) eventually flies off and scares the crap out of me with it's volume.