The title

I had a hard time coming up with the right title for this post. Initially I thought, "sometimes you're the windshield, sometimes you're the bug" would be appropriate. Then, I thought about "change is neccesary". Then, "the day started out well". "Listen to that little voice in your head". Then perhaps, "anyone got a wrench?" Then "how NOT to do costumer service", but none of them seemed to fit exactly. So here's what happened. I woke up this morning in an unusually good mood. It seemed as though it was going to be a great day. I got ready for work, got out the door early, and headed out to greet the day. I was hoping to get to work early, so that I could get some stuff done, that didn't get done last week. I pulled on the highway, and turned up the radio a bit for some Mercy Me and Casting Crown's. It was a great morning. After driving for about a half an hour I started thinking to myself, "Hmm, I wonder what I'd do if I ever got a flat on my way to work?" I thought about how my mom had changed a tire before at Grandma's, and that I new where the spare was in the car, and that I hoped that it wouldn't be a terrible blowout where you lose control of the car, and what shoulder I'd pull over to to be the safest, and then I thought about how glad I was that it had never happend, and that really, since the Camero died inches away from my house about a year and a half ago, I had never really had much car misfortune. (talk about a run-on sentence) Anyway, a couple of minutes passed when I noticed that the pavement sounded a bit different than usual, and I was wondering if it was just because there was a new surface on it, so I sped up a bit-which didn't change the sound. I pulled over to the right side lane to see if that helped when I heard a loud noise and a rumbling underneath my car! "Oh my gosh!" I thought, "I got a flat tire!". I was able to pull off the highway since there was an exit right there, and I was in the right lane. The side of the road had a wide enough gravel way on it that I pulled all the way off, and got out to take a look. Sure enough, my rear right tire was flat. Now, I had been having a particularly good morning, and I decided that a little thing like a flat tire was not going to get me down. So I started cracking up at how funny it was that not five minutes before it happened I had run down the senario in my head of what to do in such a cricumstance. However, I was lucky that it wasn't snowing, or a bad blowout. I cleaned out the trunk, to find baseball gloves, tennis balls, a bat, Ryan's golf clubs, some outdoor fold-up chairs, and branch cutters?! . After that I pulled out the spare, and the jack. I proudly figured out how to assemble and work the jack, and grabbed a rag to keep my hands from getting super rusty. I jacked up the car and then went to the trunk to find that there was no lug wrench in the car. Now, this had not been in my plans that I had made five minutes prior to blowout, what to do? I put on my hazards, and put the spare resting against the back of the car so that it was apparent that I had a flat tire, when all of the sudden a truck carrying 8 semi-truck tires passes me by on the road, and then pulls over. The guy comes back to see if I needed any help! What luck! Welllllllllllllll, perhaps not. He had no lug wrench either, nor did he know where to get one. He told me that he'd pick one up at the next stop and if I was here when he drove back in an hour that he'd help me out. He also said that the Sherrif patrolled through roughly once an hour, and that he'd be able to help me. Anyway, so I went back to my car and sat to wait. Finally a woman pulled over in a pick up, got out and was able to lend me a lug wrench. I went to work on the tire, but found that the nuts wouldn't budge and were rusted into place. She new a guy at a local farm and said that she'd be back shortly. (A local farm? It happend to be the place that Ryan and I went to pick out our pumpkins) Minutes later she returned with Ephraim, who kicked and pushed and pulled and tapped off the rust enough to get the tire off, and help me put on the spare. I ended up having to call into work, knowing that I couldn't drive there and home on a spare, and set out to get a new tire. Goodyear didn't have one, neither did the discount tires place across the street. I found that apparently you needed a special size for the Corolla. I had been giving Ryan updates, and he called the tire place that we'd purchased the tires at who got us in for an appointment at 2. I drove over there, and dropped off the car and went Christmas shopping for my nieces and nephews while I waited. I got Raleigh and Brendan done! And then it was time to head back to Tire's Plus. Now, I had been agonizing about taking the tires there, since the last THREE times we've taken the cars there we've had horrible customer service. Twice they scheduled appointments to get out car in to have parts fixed and on the first time they confused which Jeep was ours and worked on someone else's and then the second time they had told us that they had the part to fix the window and we dropped the car off to find out two days later that they never received it! Then, they never discounted our price or apologized for the inconvenience! I was livid, but decided that if Ryan could deal with them, then it was one less headache for me. Now, this time had been great. They had gotten my car in the same day, and had said that they'd fix it within an hour. I came back, looking forward to driving home with a new tire when the guy came out and told me that it wasn't a repair, but that I needed a new tire. Since that was what we had discussed when I dropped the car off, I was confused why he didn't just put on the new tire. "Oh no, we don't carry those tires in stock, we'll have to get it from somewhere else and won't have it until tomorrow". EXCUSE ME? YOU put on the tires two months ago, and you don't carry the tire in stock? Also, you knew it was going to be a new tire when I made the appointment and when I dropped off the car. Why couldn't you check that in your computer then, before I waited an hour and a half, and drove out there to find out that they couldn't fix it? Then, on top of that, the original quote was for $50, and now they were going to charge us over $100! I called Ryan, and told him what was going on, and we agreed that since this was the 9th tire (we'd gotten new Jeep and Corolla tires this past Aug/Sep) in three months, and the fact that they'd been terrible on the customer service end every time, that we were going to take the care elsewhere. As I was talking to the guy to let him know that they could put the spare back on and that I was going to go elsewhere I asked for the specs of the tire and also for the store ID number. He asked why, and I told him so that I could contact the better business bureau regarding the stores customer service record. 20 minutes later, I was given a deal for a new tire and warranties for the other three done tomorrow for $35. Now, why couldn't they have done that in the first place? I wasn't being unreasonable, nor was I being a pain, but honestly, someone has to say that they are going to contact the Better Busines Bureau in order to get customer service? That's crazy. Anyway, it all worked out. I came home, and e-mailed my manager the story of why I hadn't made it in (of course, a much shorter version) and offered to come in tomorrow which was originally supposed to be a day off. She responded with this, "I'm glad that you are OK. Take your vacation day tomorrow. Life happens and this happens. Enjoy your vacation day". Whew! At least the day ended on a great note. I am blessed by having a great husband who loves me and advocates for me, I'm blessed by my job, I've been blessed over and over again with safety in dangerous situations, I've been blessed by this little baby inside of me, and lot's of other things. It's good to know that bad days don't always have to be bad, and it's good to see the good in people when they pull over to help you on the side of the road, or get dragged out of bed to do the same. It's been a crazy, full and nuts day, but it's been fun. I hope that tomorrow is less expensive and less eventful, but I hope that I can laugh just as much.