You’re driving a car, you’re not driving an igloo.

When I hear the 4:30 a.m. beep-beep-beep of the snowplow making its early morning rounds through the Town and Village, I know that two things are in my future.

1. The roads are going to be a mess.
2. My car will need a good cleaning.

And sure enough, when I looked out my front door …

Yep, that’s Lightning’s Girl going undercover, shall we say.

Okay. Gotta assess the situation. Do you know the old adage about how skiers have several different words for snow? (granular, packed powder, man-made, etc.) I only have one word for snow. Damnit. As in, “Damnit, I gotta clean off the car.”

In this case, it looks like the snow can be brushed off with a simple broom. I won’t need a scraper or a chisel to remove the snow. But it needs to come off my car.

It needs to come ALL off my car.

And by “ALL,” I mean the entire car.

Windshield, windows, back window, all of it.

Roof, hood, trunk, all of it.

This car needs to be de-snowed down to the Chevrolet bowtie logo.

Because for me to travel anywhere, this car has to be snow-free.

Like this.

Still a few fragments to shave off, but hey, a photo is a photo.

That being said, it’s New York State law to clean your car completely off before traveling in the snow. Scraping off a quarter-sized peephole in the windshield does not count as “cleaning off the car.” And you’re not going to get Boy Scout badges because if you drive on the highway, the wind will automatically blow all the snow off your car, just like magic.

Yeah, it’ll blow all the snow off your car and into the view of the car behind you.

And you gotta clean off the roof. If you don’t, two things will happen on your commute.

1. You’ll pull up to an intersection, and the snow will slide FORWARD onto your windshield, block your windshield wipers from cleaning off the snow, and now you can’t see anything.
2. You’ll be on the highway and this flying chunk of icy snow will pop off the car in front of you, and invariably go flying toward your windshield. Ick.

Trust me. I should NOT have to explain Highway Safety 101 to you. And if you don’t get the message from me, you can be sure that Johnny Badge will pull up behind you with his flashing lights and sirens to explain the situation. Might even give you a pretty pink ticket for your troubles.

Simple highway safety. Simple courtesy. Ten minutes wiping the snow off your car will pay off later in the day – when you don’t have to pay a fine or get points on your license because of a visibility violation.

In other words … clean off your car. The life you save could be mine.