Living the Dream

My work vehicle is a 2009 Dodge Grand Caravan, the first such vehicle I've had with middle windows that actually roll down.  This is relevant.

This past Wednesday I was driving back to campus on a two lane highway, cruising at about 65mph.  I had been hounded by a fly on my entire hour+ trip, and my methods - namely rolling the front window down - had thus far failed to remove the pest.  If I sit back and look at it as a physicist, this is unsurprising.  It must be said that at this juncture I did not have my "physicist" hat on.  I was "over" this fly.  

I decided the solution to this nuisance was to roll down all of the van's windows and thereby to increase my odds of blasting this fly into the atmosphere and out of my life.  It was as foolproof a plan as I had at my disposal, short of mutually assured destruction.    It must be said, however, that I had forgotten about the box of tumblers in the back seat of the van, tumblers intended as counselor gifts, tumblers, more importantly,  packed in packing peanuts.   So I rolled the windows down and the van filled with the wind tunnel feel you would expect.  Life is good.  And then the packing peanuts started to fly.  Everywhere.  At me.  Around me.  Out the window.  Back in the other window. I had turned this minivan into a 65mph snow globe.  I screamed.  I rolled the windows up.

I will be picking up packing peanuts for weeks.