So we’ve been living in our new house for about a year. In the beginning, as with most new house
inhabitants, we were furiously decorating – picking color schemes, buying
furniture, perusing catalogues at every bathroom break, it was practically
orgasmic – and that decorating frenzy eventually came to a standstill.  This is just part of the natural transition
from “excited new homeowner” to “settled-in mortgage payer”.  Until it’s a year later and we realize we still don’t have pictures on the
wall. Or ever replaced the light
fixtures we hated. Or unpacked that last
box of knick knacks for that empty corner shelf waiting at the top of the stairs.

OK, then. Let’s get
some fricking decor up already! The catalogues are once again in the bathroom. (BTW, that whole artistically grouped
seaside artifacts thing that Pottery Barn is sporting? They stole that from me.) 

Anyway, most of this week I have also been trapped in the
house with a very clingy, whiny, contrary about everything I suggest, little three-year-old. We were sick… sick of the house, sick of
being sick, sick of each other. I needed
a break (I’m sure Chance did too, but kiddo, you don’t drive! Ha!). Saturday, when Chance actually went down for a nap and as Keen dozed on the couch, I
could see I was presented with a rare and potentially fleeting opportunity… so I
took it and I ran like hell! 

I thought a quickie art decor project would be a good pick
me up so I planned on hitting Marshall’s
(possibly Michael’s, but hoped for a sale) for good frames at discount pricing.
On the way out the door I put on my
brand new four inch, green plaid wedge sandals to break them in on my quick
trip.

Feeling all spiffy and purposeful, I arrived at Marshall’s and it was a
smorgasbord of cute household items! Frames! Prints!  Pretty glass bottles! All exactly the type of things I was looking
for. (Sometimes you just go on the right
days.) And ooh!  Look! BOOKENDS!! I can never find bookends! At least not at $7 a pop.  (They’re always, like $40 or $50 bucks. What’s up with that?)

By the end of the hour I’m all done; I’m loaded down with
frames and other goodies at ridiculously low prices, I should be back home well
before Chance is up from his nap, and my new shoes were just starting to pinch. I
was feeling quite proud of myself; I was time efficient, fiscally conscious,
and clad in cute shoes. The frames were
a bit heavy (stupid Marshall’s
doesn’t let you roll their carts past the doors) but, being such a super chick,
I managed to hold on to all my bags and totter on out to the car.

And this is where I discovered I am a dillweed.

My car had a flat tire. Which I noticed immediately
because it was flatter than flat. This
was no slow leak, but a split rubber seamed disaster. My car not only had a flat but, given the
amount of tire damage, it was probably flat when I left the house!

Did I notice? No. No I did not.

You gotta understand that I am a girl who likes
machines. I like mechanical
objects. I like cars. I’m not an aficionado by any means, but I do
go out of my way to learn enough to feel in tune with whatever car I’m
driving. Some more than others, of
course. I was much more up on my ’66 Bug
than I am on my current Audi. But then,
my Bug needed a lot more tinkering (and I’m a VW fan).  In any case, finding a sudden flat – that I
should have noticed – made me feel like a dork.

My options flashed through my mind… call Keen, call Triple
A, call tow truck. But wouldn’t you
know? My phone was sitting on its
charger at home, because what could possibly happen when I was just going
around the corner?!  OK. Loaded up all my crap in the car and hiked it
on over to the Target next door. I could
not spot a pay phone on the street level at this mall but I was certain Target
could save me. (Target’s like
that.) Shoes were definitely rubbing at
this point.

Keen’s advice, once I located a phone, was to drive it over
to a nearby Wheel Works. Oh, and while
driving to not “take it crazy”. (Duh.) Hike back to the car. Trying to back out of my parking space, two
different couples flagged me down to let me know that my tire was flatter than
flat. (Audi’s must be popular because no
one wanted to see me damage my car.) One
very nice lady called Triple A on her account for me… only to discover her
account had expired. And one very nice
guy, her friend, even offered to change out my spare tire… which was also
flat. Fuck! But the kindness from strangers was really
quite touching. (On an even more bizarre
note, I belatedly recognized the three-year-old with them. He was a classmate of Chance! Isn’t that weird? And they had offered to help me before any of us realized we sort of,
kind of knew each other.  We’re setting
up a playdate later.)

So drove my car at an annoyingly slow pace to Wheel
Works. Dennis and Marty, the guys there,
also super nice and were even going to fill my spare and change it for free. Because, you know, I was hoping to consult
with the hubby before shelling out a bunch of cash on tires right that very minute. But wait! That spare can’t be fixed! It was
damaged from a previous flat tire incident… an incident where we obviously
forgot to replace our tire. (We’re both
dillweeds!)

Call Keen again, this time from Dennis’ cell phone. At this point I’m probably half a mile from
home but it’s also unseasonably warm. Keen was OK with getting the tires (I mean, what were we going to do?) and
then asked, “So are you just going to walk home?”

I looked down at my four inch wedges, the glowing raw spots
I knew were there discretely hidden by green plaid, and said, “No, I’ll
wait.” (I should have been hobbling at
this point but I was totally playing it off. A girl has got to look poised, at least, fixing her dillweed
disaster.)

I hung out with Dennis and Marty as they worked (‘cause I
like garages, I’m weird like that) and in short order, everything was
fixed. I even made it home before Chance
woke up from his uncharacteristic, long ass nap.

But still, an all around weird day.  That trip to Marshall’s ended up being a lot more
expensive than I thought.

       – the
weirdgirl

Updated to add photo

Plaid_wedge_sandals

Honestly, I know how to change a tire.  I’ve done it before. I just didn’t want to in four inch heels.