Always Something

I came home last night, after getting some groceries.  It was after dark and as I approached my driveway about to turn in, I became distracted. I saw at the end of the block, flashlights, and two people in the yard of a disabled man.  Immediately I wondered if they were up to no good.

This distraction made me turn a bit too soon, up my driveway and then I aborted the turn, thinking I'd drive down to make sure his place was ok.  In that process I scraped the curb with my right front tire.  The air immediately whooshed out.

And they were not burglars, just his neighbors, out looking at their own Christmas lights, that they had just set up.

I got up the driveway at least before losing all the air from that tire.  I got out the jack, and the donut, and felt for the notches under the door, to fit the jack into, loosened the lug nuts, jacked it up, removed the lug nuts and damaged tire.  Then I put on the donut.  I was cursing by now, knowing there was no place open to fix it at this time on a Saturday night.

Nonetheless I went to try.  I drove to Costco, thinking they have a tire center, maybe they'll do it.  But they don't fix flats there and besides their tire center was closed.  I drove out to the huge brightly lit truck stop by Millersburg--Love's.  I saw they had an open service center and breathed in a happy sigh.

Yes!

However, the guy came out and said they only work on the big rigs.  I said "Well I haul freight."  He looked at me, like I was nuts.  "I haul cats," I said, lots of them, by the hundreds."  I could tell he wanted to help but he couldn't break the rules and sent me on my way.

I came home defeated.  Gave the bad tire a kick on the way in the garage too.

I had a feeling it could not be patched.  A quick internet search confirmed my fear.  Sidewall puncture.  Nobody will repair those.  I think its even illegal.

"Shoot," I thought.  That's all I need.  The expense of buying at least two tires.  The tread should match at least on the front tires.

This afternoon I had to net those four cats I trapped a few weeks ago in Sweet Home. She'd had me turn them loose inside her place, in a little room she uses for storage.  It's full of boxes.  I thought it might be a problem to catch them when I had spay neuter room.  They had a stray male they feed also that was not fixed.  I wasn't going to let a go slow donut on one side stop me from keeping promises and fixing cats.  I drove on up.

This lady had to let her car go back to where she bought it, she said.  She couldn't afford it, not the payments or the insurance.   She shops online when she can get on a neighbors computer to do it and her son walks to Safeway which is only a few blocks from where she lives, for groceries.  She has no internet and only a handful of minutes a month on a cheap cell phone.  No TV connection either, outside of now and then they pick up a neighbors Wifi, but the signal isn't strong enough, she said, to really watch anything.  So they collect DVD's at garage sales to watch.

They make do, but her life isn't that easy.  She's a senior citizen living on SS.

There are lots of people living like that around here.   So my little tire problem isn't that big by comparison but it is a financial setback for me.

It wasn't too hard to move boxes and get the hiding cats, a mom and her three older kittens, to go into traps, one at a time.  Took maybe an hour, of not working that hard at it.

And I got the stray male they feed too.  Well they did.  I came out and they'd gotten him into a trap and he was already in my car.  Now that was easy.

On the way home, I stopped at the Walmart tire center.  They were open today, the only place, but they didn't answer their phone.  I tried twice.  My tire size is a little hard to find.   So I asked if they had my size and they had only one tire, a low ender, my size, but it would be too late by the time I got home, to get back before they closed.  I didn't have the tire with me and would need that.

Then I went and picked up two cats from an apartment complex.  One was from the woman who got scratched last time.  She had it down by now.  She lived on the streets, which is where she found this tiny little adult cat she has.  Then she had a stroke on the streets and now has a place to live, and so does her cat.   Her neighbor helped her get the cat into the carrier and I also have his cat.  He used to work up at the park, cleaning restrooms.  I knew him from there and he found this cat in the park too, had been dumped.  So she's getting fixed too.  He quit the job at the park.  Didn't pay enough and its a long drive to make up and back every day.  That's gas money.

I brought those two home, then went out to Willy's colony, hoping to catch a couple there that are not fixed.  I'd seen two without ear tips.  I caught them fast too. 

I have nine cats for tomorrow's slow mo ride up to the clinic, gimping it with the donut.  I'll be getting all the dirty looks going too slow on the freeway tomorrow.

I gave the tenth spot I had to a local woman.  She tells me today her starter is going out, so she's not sure she'll make it up there with the cat.  I offered to take the cat for her but she said "nope, I wanna try".  So good luck to her too, with her car problems.

  I was going to get two tires at Discount Tire up there, after dropping off the cats,  but then I find out they're closed tomorrow for some reason.  So I'll try Beggs here tomorrow.  I don't have time for Schwab.  You can wait forever there, hours in fact, and I don't have time for that tomorrow.

It's always something.