How Not to Change a Tire

This one's from Gerald...

Every once in a while. Just every once in a while. Why can't a simple thing in my life be simple???

Tim and I have been planning to put new tires on the truck for about a month, then Brien and Susan came down. We all know what happened then! Woopie, new baby!

Last night we went out to dinner at Cheeseburgers in Paradise with some friends down from MA for the week. Gravel parking lot. Screw in the tire. Ok, made it home safely with no flat. Scotty (one of the friends from MA) was going to come by this morning, run to the auto store to pick up a patch plug kit. He came by but the tire was holding air so we decided it would probably be ok if I drove on it again to go buy new tires. So I did, but...(here's where it starts to get complicated!)

The guy who sells tires doesn't mount tires. This is St. Croix. You go to the tire guy, buy your tires, then go to a tire "shop" to get them mounted. Seems simple enough, right? Simple unless you have a screw in your tire.

I made it to the tire guy, bought 4 new tires. Headed off to the tire shop to get them mounted. Got less than a mile and had a flat. How on earth did that happen you might ask? Well, dumbass me was driving with a screw in the tire (I really thought you'd get that one.).

So I pull into a shopping plaza. Called Tim. Asked him to call Scotty to come help me. He couldn't reach Scotty by phone, so he rode his bike down to their house. No one home. He rode back to our house to call me. I told him to call our friend Julie. Surely she could help or know someone who could. Her assistant Jill picked Tim up and brought him to me so we could change the tire. Oh...but we couldn't find the tool you use to lower the spare from under the truck! Yeah, ok, still with me?

So Jill calls Honnie, our realtor here. Honnie has this woman who changes her flats for her, so she called the woman to come help us. Woman calls me on cell, I tell her where to find me. She comes but it took her over an hour to change the tire. I swear, it must have been the first truck tire she'd ever changed. She didn't have a clue. But imagine if you will, Tim and I standing there watching this woman crawl around on the ground changing our tire...there's a picture for you!

Anyway, she finally got the tire changed so we got on our way to the tire shop. He got us in relatively quickly, put the spare back under the truck, mounted and balanced the new tires in about 45 minutes and we were off! Finally! Headed home to clean up, relax, and figure out what we would do for supper.

About a mile from the tire shop we go around a curve and hear a sound like we had clipped an aluminum can and sent it scurrying off across the road. Hmmmm. Ok, next curve same sound, except much louder and this time accompanied by some very alarming clacking noises. Oh yeah, this is Gerald's life. So I whip into the parking lot of a closed Feed store before the tire could fall off. It nearly had. The lug nuts were barely hanging on. So Tim gets out the lug wrench and proceeds to tighten down all the lug nuts.

Yes, we actually DID make it home and are about to go have some supper. But an hour or two errand turned in to an all day affair for me with drama at every turn, literally. Such is my life. Please...trade me???