Monday Morning Blowout

7:45am, Rt 495NB in Middleboro, my rear driver side tire decided it had had enough- and blew out. Thankfully (and I did actually remember to give thanks to God as I awaited AAA's arrival) it happened to me, on a sunny morning, on a holiday for most folks (light traffic day), the snow banks were gone, and there was plenty of room and solid ground to pull completely off the hiway onto the median strip. I remembered how scared Mary was when it happened a few years ago to her one morning, and was grateful that it was me driving this time. I was thankful that it didn't happen to Corey (he was originally going to borrow the truck and drive to NH for the weekend, but that plan fell through). I was grateful that it didn't happen to me yesterday as I was driving to the rink (as it was, my refereeing partner was late arriving and I had to ref the first two periods alone, and Lord knows nothing happens quickly when you have roadside car troubles). I was glad it didn't happen after work when I would have been on my way to pick up Julie at the train station (she has already suffered enough "alone a on train" trauma. All things considered, it couldn't have happened at a more opportune time & place - so again I say "Thank You God" (although being thankful over a blowout does seem a bit unusual!). Back in the fall, I had attempted to rotate my tires because one of the front ones was starting to wear a bit unevenly, but I could not remove the spare from underneath the truck bed (probably been there since 1995) and settled for simply moving the front tire to the rear (thats the one that blew). Jamie's Vo-Tech school was supposed to swap it when they took it in for some other work, but didn't for fear of breaking badly rusted parts. So I knew trying to change my flat would be futile so I didn't bother wasting my time and I simply called AAA for help. Of course, as I was waiting for the AAA operator to pull up my information, I noticed that my account expired on Feb 1st. She then proceeded to ask me if I was aware of it. Thankfully, she was able to take my credit card information and renew me over the phone from the median strip. I told her exactly were I was located and she informed me that help would arrive in about half an hour. One hour later, the service company driver called explaining that he had just gotten OFF of exit 4 (the exit number I told AAA that I was just BEYOND) and couldn't find me. I politely told him to get back onto the hiway and IMMEDIATELY get into the left hand lane (in my rear view mirror I could see the traffic merging at the end of the ramp). A service minivan pulled up, manned by a clearly inexperienced young man who was completely unable to help me (I had actually anticipated a ramp truck and a lift to the nearest garage). As a final demonstration of his inexperience, he borrowed my cell phone to call his shop for backup! He then gave back my phone and left. In a while, I saw the ramp truck approach (wrong lane) and shoot past, and waited while it went to the next exit and looped around again. Impressively, the new attendant was able to get the spare free, and changed the tires. Of course the spare - tho not a "donut" - was a pickup truck version of one and had permenent indentations on the side wall from years of being tightly clamped under the truck. Instead of prceeding to work, I decided I would be wise to go get an actual replacement tire instead. So I am taking a sick day, bought a used tire for $15, spent $15 more to get it mounted, and finally unloaded the old treadmill I have been lugging around in the back (long story) and got #3.60 for it at the metal recycling place!
All's well that ends well!