I suppose I could blame the flat tire on the way home from picking up my kids at school. That certainly derailed everything which came after. I had to call a neighbor to retrieve the kids so they wouldn’t be late for an after school activity and I when my van limped into the high school lot for a parent teacher conference we were rolling on one of those tiny spare tires. Yet the flat came late in the day and by that time I’d already failed to accomplish most of the things on my list. The flat merely prevented me from plowing through the list in the late afternoon.
So the list for tomorrow is long. I intend to hit it hard first thing in the morning. For this evening I shall be grateful that the local average time from beginning to change a flat and the arrival of volunteer help is less than 10 minutes. I’ll also be grateful for kind neighbors who show up at my door with treats which I can serve as a bedtime snack. While I’m at it, I’ll be glad that my kids consider canned chili and tortilla chips to be an excellent dinner choice. I’ll top all that with gratitude that the tire was brand new and under warranty, so that when they discovered that the tire had rolled along too flat and the interior side walls were broken, the replacement was free under warranty.
Life is good and there is a stack of boxes in my family room filled with signed calendars. We got that much done in the morning. By Saturday afternoon it will all be done.
I had a flat this week too and it totally threw everything off that day. I’m glad it turned out well and you have so many blessings.
Almost two years ago, I had a similar experience.
My wife was not feeling well, and required my presence at home. Given that this was winter in Michigan, the roads were slick.
I took a ramp a little too fast, and the back end of my car slid faster than the front end. I end up sliding off and down the embankment. Fortunately, it was not *that* steep an embankment, so I did not have a Wile E. Coyote moment. Nor did I hit anything substantial such as trees, stumps of trees, or large rocks. Nor did I hit my head. I really wasn’t even shaken up beyond the stream of cursing I let fly when I finally came to a stop.
Unfortunately, the embankment was still pretty tall, so I couldn’t drive the car back onto the road (30′ of muddy hillside, at least 10% grade. Not going anywhere under my own power, I was up to my wheel hubs in mud.)
But on the good fortune side, within a minute of coming to stop at the bottom of the embankment, a doctor (who was right behind me coming off duty) was a) asking if I was ok [I was], b) if I had hit my head [I didn’t, it was a pretty gentle slide down the embankment], and c) even though I lived a good 45 minutes away, did I need a ride home?
I was going to accept this offer, however, a few minutes later, someone with a sufficiently large and varied set of tow chains pulled up. We were (well, the kind bystander) able to get my car back onto the road within 20 minutes.
I am glad things turned out well for you.