Here in MI, it is currently Winter, and we are at that time of year where the weather doesn't quite know which way it's going to go. We get a wintery mix of rain, snow, ice, sleet, sunshine, more snow, freezing drizzle, etc. We also have two cars, one of which gets used much less frequently than the other (to the tune of only once or twice a week). This means that the car my wife usually uses tends to sit idle for many days at a time.
Well, there came a day last week where my wife had to free the idle car from its icy prison, and had to do so in a hurry and without me around to help, and as a result the passenger-side wiper was still frozen to the windshield when she accidentally hit the wiper activation lever, causing the wiper blade to tear mostly loose from the wiper arm and frame. Additionally, because she was panicking about shredding the passenger-side wiper (because of the elevated hurry/rush/go/go/going on), she also inadvertently triggered the rear wiper to run, tearing it as well. The driver-side wiper had already been freed, so it was ok. So now there are two wipers on the car that are sort of just...dangling a skinny rubber strip that is no good for actually wiping anything.
"Hang on," I said. "I'm pretty sure I at least have a spare rear wiper I bought a while ago" (because the rear wiper can be hard to find, so I was pretty sure I had bought a second one as a spare the last time I had to replace it). Dug through the crates where I was sure I'd left it OVER FIVE YEARS AGO and discovered that sure enough, I did have a spare rear blade...and apparently I'd also bought another passenger-side one at the same time because they were on clearance (according to the tag). So...that was some particularly prescient planning, past me.
--Patrick
