To my neighbor scraping ice off his car at 5 am on Saturday

Good morning! I don’t know if you noticed or not, but it was 5am and on a Saturday when you spent that hour or so vigorously scraping, ney beating, ice off your car. I will ignore the fact that you are doing this simply because you probably have a job you have to get to and in this economy, well, hey I don’t want you to lose your job because you were late. But really kind sir, I must say your ice scraping was taking you forever and seems to have turned in to quite the laborious task. Being a native of the colder climates myself and a bit of student in the art of winter weather, might I offer this handy guide to getting that pesky ice off your car?

1) De-icing the car door: So you get to the car and find that you can’t open it. Take your key and warm it up in you hand, breathe on it if you have to. Slide your key around the seam of your door; this should move enough ice that you can open it up with a firm tug. Not too firm! We don’t want you falling backwards and breaking anything like your coccyx or your head! Coccyx is a fun word to say isn’t it? COCCYX! It’s like word a superhero would use to make his powers work. COCCYX! then BAM! the bad guys blow up.

2) Get in the car: I know, seems like an odd step, but here me out. Once you get in the car, turn it on, unless you are one of those bastards with keyless entry and start up, in which case you may have damaged your coccyx for no reason as you could have started the car up before trying to de-ice the door thereby saving you some time, troubles, and the injury to your coccyx.

Anyway, get in the car and turn it on. Turn the heat, the front window defroster, and the rear window defroster all on hot & high. While that is starting up and heating the car, you can look for your ice scraper, which is undoubtedly not where you think it is. Look in the backseat…not there? check in the glove compartment….I’ll wait while you riffle through that mess….not there either? Did you put in the trunk for some inexplicable reason? No? Are you sure? No, don’t bother to get out and look that would be silly. Well, I’m sure you are starting to sweat a little, but trust me all the heat blowing around in there is a good thing. Did you look under the driver seat? I know I had one that always ended up…oh good you found it! Actually while we’re talking about your ice scraper…

2a) Get a real ice scraper. No doubt, you are using one of those namby-pamby small plastic ice scrapers you get free from gas stations and insurance salesmen.

That thing is a waste of time and energy (not to mention a waste of valuable polypropylene, which is made from oil…so maybe you should hold on to it in case you need to melt it down for fuel later when the coming economic apocalypse hits).

What you want to get is one of these:

As you can see the expandable handle has a nice grip in the center allowing for more force and therefore allows for a more thorough ice removal. The handy brush on the other end is also far superior to those crappy plastic and wood things that will splinter when you hit them against the neighbor kids when they ice up the sidewalk. I hate those bastards too you know. See, something we have in common! Anyway, really spend the $ and get one of these nice scrapers, you won’t be sorry and you won’t lose it under the car seat. Or in that shame of a glove box; seriously was that a cheeseburger wrapper in there?

3) Crank up the tunes! Everyone needs good ice scraping music, so crank up the radio loud enough to be heard out side of the car with the windows closed and the engine running. I know, I know, I was complaining about the sound of your ice scraping and now I am telling you to turn up the music. Trust me, no one will hear it and if they do, they won’t mind that for the short period that it will be that loud.

4) Get scraping! Jump out of the car (slowly, be careful of that coccyx) and let’s get to work on that windshield! Assuming you still have that crappy one (and of course you do, I mean where would you go on foot because your car is still covered in ice at 5 am to buy a new better one?), using both hands grasp the ice scraper at the middle and the very end of the handle. This should give you the force necessary to remove the stubborn stuff. Starting at the top of the windshield, start pushing/scraping the ice in a diagonal direction toward the wipers. This should be relatively easy now that your heater and engine have melted much of the ice that was directly on the glass. Again, since you have that shitty scraper, use your arm to brush away any large chunks.

5) Don’t forget the mirrors and door windows! You may have to readjust the side mirrors, but really you will thank me for reminding you when you try to flip off the yahoo riding your ass only to find out it’s a cop. LOL, what am I saying! You’re a guy! You don’t use mirrors! Those are for pussies and girls!

But really do the door windows and not just a damned circle large enough for you to peer out off. It’s a car, not a sub, and those should not be used like a porthole.

6) The back window: By the time you get around to here, the ice should be just sliding down the window to the trunk. Again, just use your arm to brush the snow/ice off the car.

7) DONE! See how much easier that was than the torture you went through Saturday morning!?!

Now on your way home, go buy a real ice scraper. You’ll thank me later.

xoxo,

boobarella