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Friday, July 21, 2006 Of Inefficiency and Rain Early this morning, Chicago was under the spell of a thunderstorm—and since I usually leave the windows on my car cracked open a couple of inches to keep the car from becoming a miniature greenhouse, this was a problem. You wouldn’t think an inch or two of air would be enough to let much rain in, but the entire car was thoroughly soaked. The closest thing I had to a towel in the car (because of course I didn’t discover that the seats were wet until I was already in the car) was a green tablecloth (why a tablecloth? Because I broke down one of our events for work the other day, and everything from our booth was still in it). So I draped the tablecloth over the driver’s seat and went to work. But there was a second problem. As I was driving on the freeway, I suddenly got a flat tire. I contemplated calling roadside assistance since I didn’t want to get wet (it was still pouring), but decided that I wasn’t that much of a wuss and started changing my tire. After 10-15 minutes, a limo stopped behind me and its driver got out and asked if I’d like any help, which I gratefully accepted. So my job became holding the largest umbrella known to man. It’s a good thing the limo driver offered to help, because in the end I wouldn’t have been able to get the tire off myself. Once all the nuts were off the wheel (after one of the bolts broke—rust), he had to hammer at the wheel for a good 20 minutes before it decided it wanted to leave its home (more rust). Apparently it’s been a while since the tires have been changed. Happily, that bit of the morning ended well, though I was rather late getting to the office. After work I took the car to Pep Boys to get them to replace the bolt that broke and fix the flat (driving with three nuts holding the wheel in place instead of four for any length of time didn’t seem like the greatest idea), which they said would take an hour (this was at 4pm). I left. At 8pm I realized that the repair shop still hadn’t called me to say that the car was ready, so I called them and found out that they still weren’t done—but that they would be finished by close at 9pm. Half an hour later I still hadn’t heard back, so I just got a friend to drive me to the shop, hoping that they’d have completed the repair by the time I got there. After some confusion, I paid my bill and left just after close. About an hour later, I was going to put some stuff in the trunk when I realized that although they’d fixed the original tire and put it on the car, they hadn’t returned the spare to the trunk. I’m assuming it’s still at the shop, which I need to call tomorrow. Sigh. ^ Top | 12:36 AM | | | 
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