Monty by Jim Meddick for January 12, 2021

I know my domain well. I can find my car in my driveway with my eyes closed. Probably not in YOUR driveway though.

I live in sunny California. Why do people have to put up the wiper blades in a snowstorm?

Valpak! (Shouted like Kirk in ST 2)

DON’T put your wiper blades up on your car like Monty – wiper arms have springs in them that tension them to the windshield.

They can be lifted up like this to be serviced, but aren’t intended to be stretched like that for long periods. They will get slack and then won’t clear your windshield; the fix is to replace the arms (and they are hard to get off when they corrode to the spindles)… ;-)

Luckily there’s a coupon for wiper blades in the Valpak.

For Californians and Floridians, you put the windshield wipers up so that don’t freeze to the windshield overnight.

Reminds me of a New Outer Limits episode where a few teenagers are trapped inside of a school by an alien….”Abduction”

“The rope’s gone slack!” – classic

“Neither snow nor rain nor heat nor gloom of night stays these couriers from the swift completion of their appointed rounds” Charles W. Eliot

When I was in high school, there was the worst blizzard/snowstorm in more than 40 years. Winter of ‘68-’69. People living in the country were stranded in their houses because of the amount of snow. There were whiteout conditions in some places. I was delivering newspapers, they got to us late so I was out late. I got caught in it and could not see more than a few feet from me, could not see the houses that were right there. I walked the three to four blocks home by keeping one foot on the curb and the other on the street. When I would come to an intersection, I would mentally point myself about 30 to 45 degrees to my right and walk until I tripped over the curb on the perpendicular street. Then I would resume my course maintaining my position. The snow let up just before I got to my house and I could see it from the street. We learned about doing that when I took Nebraska History and they told about people being in a whiteout in the Great Blizzard of 1888. THey were not as fortunate as many people went out and could not even see their hand in front of their face. We had a teacher who taught us to do what I did if we were ever in that situation. Probably saved my life. There were people who were out on the highway who ran off the road and died. They got out of their car to go for help and were found in the spring when the snow melted.

That’s mail froid.

I learned a lot today. Mainly, to stay put.

Where is that mailbox? Why did Monty come in the back door? How did the rope go slack when Monty seemingly walked around the house? Too many loose ends, too many ValPak coupons, today.

—Not to mention the snow….