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International Check Your Wipers Day 2024
Well, it’s getting to the time of year when your wipers will need to work extra hard to shove ice and snow aside. Appropriately, today is International Check Your Wipers Day.
Heave Mightily To Displace
When something large and oncoming passed, the windshield’s big rectangle was for a moment incandesced and opaque with water, which the wipers heaved mightily to displace. ~David Foster Wallace
There’s nothing more upsetting than having damaged wipers when you really need them.
The worst part is that when you find out the hard way that your wipers aren’t up to the job, it’s almost never when you’re anywhere near a store that sells them.
Typically, you’re on the turnpike or limited access highway with miles to the next exit.
So, as an ounce of prevention, somebody designated today as the day to check your wipers.
I haven’t had to worry about this all week because Kelly and Dorothy and I were way down yonder in the land of 🌴 palm trees 🌴 visiting my parents.
We had a lovely time and were glad to see where Mom & Dad have been keeping busy these last several years.
Needless to say, while lovely and full of interesting things to see, the land of perpetual 🌞 Summer 🔥 is not somewhere I could stay for very long.
I like hills. I like seasons. I like late 🍂Autumn🍂 feeling like late 🍂Autumn🍂.
We’re very grateful for the hospitality and the time visiting with family. It was a lovely visit and we look forward to the next time we can get down to Florida.
Simple Upkeep
How to Check Your Wipers
Fortunately, wipers are a fairly simple thing to install. I’ve had some that were a bear to figure out, but most wipers these days are set up so even a guy with ten thumbs can change them out.
Sure, it’s a nuisance. It’s one of those things you just have to put on your calendar to remember to get new ones. Tooth brushes, air filters, windshield wipers. You’ve just got to.
Like I said, critical failure almost never occurs where it’s convenient to jump in and grab a fresh set. It’s almost always on the highway or way out in the boonies.
Of course, if you like to wait until they’re completely untenable, you can always buy a set and keep them in your trunk. That way, it doesn’t matter if you’re on the highway or out in the hinterlands.
An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure, as they say.
Scrape & Squeak
“Dirk turned on the car wipers, which grumbled because they didn’t have quite enough rain to wipe away, so he turned them off again. Rain quickly speckled the windscreen. He turned on the wipers again, but they still refused to feel that the exercise was worthwhile, and scraped and squeaked in protest.”
― ~Douglas Adams, The Long Dark Tea-Time of the Soul
As you well know, this is the part of the post where I talk about writing in some way, shape or form.
Well, I’m back from vacation and my head isn’t quite in the game yet.
What I can say is that I’ve been stalled out on writing because I’ve been stressed out on working.
Now that I’m back from my tropical 🌴 hiatus, the thing that will help me catch up on The Lights of Pine Hollow is my belated No Monday In 4Q Policy.
Not only did I have to work all the Mondays in October, but I’ve also been working quite a few weekends lately.
Sorry, but we simply can’t have that.
The No Monday In 4Q Policy is not just to facilitate writing but also to forestall 🥴🤯 burnout 😵⚰️.
I’ve been there. I’ve done that. It’s not pretty and I’m not going through it again. Point blank. End of story.
So, now that the world has gotten back on its usual axis, I should be able to report more progress and have enough brain cycles available to say something writerly now and again.
That’s all for today. We need to go fetch our fuzz-baby back from Emmeline’s place and really set everything back to normal around here.