The Last Thing A Bug Sees....

So the joke goes like this...

What's the last thing a bug sees before it hits your windshield?

It's ass.

I think this might have a bit of a chicken and egg story. Some of you may remember this famous Porsche Poster that I am pretty sure is from 1996.

Great car and a great ad. But, which came first? Was it the joke that inspired the ad, or was it the ad that inspired the joke. Or, did those crazy Germans just come up with it? Let's face it, Germans aren't exactly known for their sense of humor, so I'm guessing the joke was around before the ad.

Anyway, bugs on windshields are what led me to today's Mydea.

Here's the usual scenario. You're out driving and a bug (or several bugs) hits your windshield as shown in the lovely image above. Bam! There it is in the middle of your field of vision. Even though years of experience should have taught you better, you pull back the wiper arm in an attempts to wash it off the window. You cross your fingers hoping that this time will be different, but...Nope. Sure enough, it smears bug guts all over the windshield in a perfect arc and is way worse than the single spot of bug guts was. For anyone that shares my obsessive compulsive disorder for a clean windshield, this is absolute torture.

Well, as I'm sure you have guessed, I've solved the problem.

Windshield Scripers: Windshield wipers that have a built in scrubby sponge to effectively clean off any bugs or other nastiness from the windshield. It's kind of like my other half and half ideas, since it's half wiperand half scrubby sponge. This one's a little more serious. See diagram and explanation below. (Click on picture for larger view.)

It functions as a normal wiper when set to intermittent, low or high. But, when you pull back the lever to "wash", the arm pivots at the pivot point shown in the diagram to put the green scrubby sponge side against the window while the wiper fluid is dispensed. The scrubby sponge along with the wiper fluid quickly powers through any stuck on bug guts, then it pivots back to the normal wiper blade part to do the final "squeegee" wipe, leaving the windshield clean and dry. The scrubby sponge part would snap on to the wiper arm so that it can be replaced independent of the rest of the wiper assembly. Plus, since the scrubby part is doing all of the major scraping of baked on goop, the wipers would last much longer anyway. See how I'm always thinking about saving money? After a few months, the scrubby part would be full of bug guts and other grime, so you can just replace it.

Genius? Just so so? Stupid? Let me know what you think.


P.S. Consider this copyrighted, tradmarked, or whatever else I have to do to make sure I can get credit if anyone steals this idea. Any of my readers patent attorneys?