Thursday, October 6, 2011

Not a Good Year for Tires in Our House...

So, you might remember this post, when I blew out a tire on my truck. Well, not to be outdone, DH blew out both driver's side tires on his van this week. Monday, or it might have been Tuesday morning. I've been sick, and sleeping a lot, so I've sorta lost track of the days of the week a bit. He was getting ready to go to bed (he works nights, and sleeps during the day) in the morning, and went out to get something for me. He must have been sleepier than he realized, and apparently hit a curb or something as he was making a U-turn to get to our street. He had to ride on the rims to get to the house. I didn't think to take pictures of it, but it was ugly.

Because nothing is ever straightforward with us, and (mostly) because DH really, really likes to do everything himself if he can, he decided not to do what I suggested -- get a flatbed truck to tow it to the dealership, where he could get two new tires put on two new rims, get them mounted on the front (and the remaining sound front tire moved to the left rear), and get it aligned. No, he thought he'd "keep things simpler" (yes, he actually used that expression with a straight face!) and do it this way: get new rims from the dealer, go to a local tire/service place and get tires and get them mounted on the rims, replace the tires in the right places on the van himself, then drive the van to the dealer to get an alignment. Where I'd have to pick him up, and then drive him back to the dealership when the alignment was done. Yes, definitely simpler that way, right? Well, proving the old adage that the best laid plans of mice and men, etc., it didn't work out like that. He called the dealer, and they only had one rim in. The second one would be in today. So today he went and picked up the two rims, drove to the place where he was going to buy the tires, chose what he wanted, and left the rims. Well, they called back to say that there were pressure sensors in the tires, and they couldn't put the new tires on the rims without them. He didn't think his vehicle had them, but he went out and looked, and sure enough, it did. But our driveway's on a bit of an incline, and he didn't think it would be stable enough to jack the van up, and leave it jacked up, so he could remove the old rims and get to the sensors to take them in. As if to prove that point, the van slid off the jack and rolled out into the street. Sigh! So I proposed that maybe now the most sensible thing was to go with my original suggestion. He got the rims back from the other place where he'd left them, and I called AAA to get a flat-bed tow truck dispatched. They should have it done tomorrow -- but it could have been done and back here already if we'd gone this route to start. Still, we learn to pick our battles, don't we?

I don't have any pictures of that whole debacle to share, but here's a picture of Max, who's annoyed because he was sleeping until he heard the camera, and got disturbed. That's his "don't bother me, I'm sleeping" glare ;-)



I'm hoping to do some knitting and/or quilting tonight, so maybe there'll be progress to show tomorrow. Thanks for coming by to play. Come back again soon.

3 comments:

  1. max looks like a cat with a LOT of personality! loved the tire story. sounds like what we go thru around here. i've been on dh for months to fix the sink, even bought the new part, and finally today he looks at it and decides we need more parts. who knows how long it will take now... sigh.

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  2. Sounds like one of our debacles! thanks for sharing!

    Bari

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  3. @bunbear, thanks -- Max DOES have a lot of personality, when he can wake up enough to express it. His life looks about as tough as your Ivy's ;-)

    @Bari -- it's easier to share here than to try to make DH see sense, sometimes. But he's got his van back, and all is well...

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