The bliss of traffic jams and broken car radios

My way to work has been a living hell for the last couple of month. Not only do I have to fight my way through the morning rush hour: the latter is worsened by a - seemingly - eternal constrution site on the highway. There is no appropriate utterance to describe the annoyance of a daily traffic jam.

And also, my car radio is broken. When I turn it on I get mostly static and some chunks of music or only vaguely funny commentaries by the two hilarious (they believe it, no doubt) morning show hosts. I am normally better off by turning the volume down.

Daily traffic jam AND no decent acoustic entertainment - enough to drive people nuts, right?

However, I found out something very interesting about this apparently unfortunate blend:
It can be a bliss!

No, wait, hear me out:
40 minutes in a car with nothing else to do, no kids, no other obligations, basically the only time of the day, when I have time to clear my head, and also - very important - no distractions
- the perfect time to be really creative.

I've made up the characters of my next novel during those long hours. They told me quite a lot about themselves. Being more of a pantser than a plotter, I have never known so much about my characters, before I even started to write the novel. It is, in fact, very pleasing. When I finally arrive at work, I head into my office and jot down, what I have come up with, because this is the only really annoying part: Not having a white board and lots of pens with me in the car. Oh well, I just consider it a bonus - a free brain excercise.