Michael Janke

… and one campervan windshield.

The turkey came from the left ditch and flew across the road from left to right. I ducked, the bird did not. The strike was hard enough to break the windshield but not hard enough to put the turkey inside the van, so no free turkey dinner this Thanksgiving.

It took me about two seconds to figure out what happened, that other than being showered in glass, feathers and turkey poop I was okay – and that the van was drivable. I wear prescription eyeglasses, so my eyes were protected. But I had glass in my hair, ears, shoes, shirt, pants pockets and underwear.

I didn’t stop. For some reason stopping didn’t seem necessary. Other than the glass fragments, feathers and poop I was ok & the van was ok, and stopping on the side of the road would not change either of those.

It was raining hard so my priority was to keep the rain from getting in the van until I could come up with a plan for getting out of the rain, getting myself cleaned up, and getting the windshield replaced. I reached over to where I had a seat cushion laying loose and used that to stuff in the hole and keep some of the rain and wind out. I figured out that I could prop the cushion up against the busted glass and still see and drive well enough to keep going though the rain. That allowed me to drive at 40 – 50 mph for the hour that it took to get to a small town, stop and figure out a plan.

I got lucky and found a small locally owned glass shop that let me pull inside and start vacuuming the debris out of my clothes, hair and the van. They couldn’t get a new windshield that day, but offered to leave the van in their shop overnight and replace the windshield the next morning.

My niece picked me up and drove me and hour and a half to home. Much appreciated…

Feathers and glass ended up everywhere. The glass flew all the way to the back of the van. The poop only made it half way back.

Quite a bit of the stuff in the van is tainted with debris and glass. We’re tossing most of it out.

Getting the van cleaned up will take a few passes. The debris is in and under everything – cabinets, rugs, seats – everywhere. Seems like after a good vacuuming the glass and feathers magically reappear an hour later.

Mondays…