Christmas is usually stressful for me, this one more than usual. I think I did okay, got the nieces and nephews decent presents and all. But yesterday's visit at my mom's was cut short, just a hello/goodbye with my brother and a short while with my Sis and her kids. The problem was that they were planning on staying the night so they took plenty of time to get to Mom's - and rightly so for their purposes. We, however, were planning on coming home that night. About an 80 mile drive for us, but we all drove similar distances. Except for us, as we were leaving Madison a familiar problem came up.
The driver's side windshield wiper does not work when I drive highway speeds. Actually the arm doesn't provide enough downward pressure so the wiper has a chance. It must actually lift off the surface. The last time this was a problem was last Christmas making the same drive, otherwise my truck is only driven in town. I remember now stopping at an open service station and buying a new wiper blade last year (didn't help). The roads Saturday were wet, so all that salty water spray leaves a film on the windshield that I can't get wiped off while driving on the highway. I took extra care, even going slower than normal (i.e. the actual speed limit), to keep from having a vehicle driving in front of me for too long. When we arrived my windshield looked almost whitewashed, but the wiper cleaned it easily while sitting in their driveway. And yes, I had washer fluid but that was downright dangerous to spray on on the highway when the wiper couldn't wipe it away.
The driver's side windshield wiper does not work when I drive highway speeds. Actually the arm doesn't provide enough downward pressure so the wiper has a chance. It must actually lift off the surface. The last time this was a problem was last Christmas making the same drive, otherwise my truck is only driven in town. I remember now stopping at an open service station and buying a new wiper blade last year (didn't help). The roads Saturday were wet, so all that salty water spray leaves a film on the windshield that I can't get wiped off while driving on the highway. I took extra care, even going slower than normal (i.e. the actual speed limit), to keep from having a vehicle driving in front of me for too long. When we arrived my windshield looked almost whitewashed, but the wiper cleaned it easily while sitting in their driveway. And yes, I had washer fluid but that was downright dangerous to spray on on the highway when the wiper couldn't wipe it away.
What all this meant was that I wanted to get back on the road before the dark of night to more safely navigate our way home. Our stay was a semi-respectable 3 and a half hours, but unfortunately not the same timeline as my sib's. There were, of course, other factors in making this particular day a little extra stressful, including the embarrassment of making a mess of crackers whilst about to eat chili and having to clean up more snow before we left. Also, it's not lost on me how negative my Christmas Pic Dump was, either. What I chose to post was somehow representative of how I really feel about holidays, I'm sure. I even had a cigarette yesterday. I can only take so much holiday before the cracks start to show. I try to be good about it, really I do...
Anyway, I hope my brother, sister, sister in law, mom, mom's bf Dan, and both of my nieces and both of my nephews had a great time with their big slumber party last night. It's just not my style, I like shorter visits and my own bed. Perhaps things would be different if we did the procreating thing, too. Perhaps not.
