Good morning readers. Thanks for coming by for a read this morning.
Having a running vehicle I can just brush the cats off of, scare the chickens out from underneath and drive somewhere is surprisingly uplifting. Not having to borrow Little Red wouldn’t seem to the disinterested observer to be that big a deal, but it is.
Got me feeling uppidy in ways I’m going to need to treat with circumspection and discipline so’s I don’t run myself dry buying gasoline for trips I wouldn’t have made in a borrowed machine. But damn it feels good anyway.
Those trips to TimeWarpVille [Junction, Texas] trying to get something they’d accept at the courthouse as valid to transfer the title, trips to Kerrville trying to chase down the guy who sold it to me would have been frustrating teeth-grinding to me most of my life. But they were pure joy, driving along looking at the country, looking at whatever, ignoring the 100+ F. wind blowing through the windows in favor of the freedom it represented.
So yesterday I thought of a reason to drive into Harper. The day before I’d noticed a piece of the right front tire peeled back on the side, probably something on the driveway flipped up and cut it. So I was being careful, occupying 30-35 MPH when it blew. Got her stopped without ruining the rim.
Sweated blood and bullets getting the car up on the jack. Crumpled a piece of the underbody before I found the secret, unlikely place the top of the jack has to go to lift it. Discovered the spare is a wheelbarrow tire, which was under-inflated, but left part of an inch of inflated tire between the rim and the ground. Inched that money-maker home at 2.5 miles per hour.
Gave me time to shoot gratitude affirmations for it all out to the Universe and Old Sol. Because that blowout’s a major blessing.
When I pulled the tire off the brake disk rotor was exposed to me, badly eaten because there was nothing much like a pad. Bare metal just grinding pleasant rings into the rotor. A lot of people would probably replace that rotor, but I think I’ll try just buying pads. No reason to get extreme, over-react, do anything dramatic.
But if that tire hadn’t blown I’d never have noticed I had problem needed immediate attention, not to put off until the next Social Security pension check arrives to provide me a something for nothing entitlement [as these Texans are fond of calling it].
So today I’m going into Kerrville and buy me a spanking new tire, buy a set of brake pads, and even let the guys who sell me the tire put the new one on the ground.
Christmas. It just don’t get much better than this.
Old Jules
So Far From Heaven 
I’d like to have the $ I contributed to social security to keep in my mattress, don’t care about the employers’ contribution. Something for nothing, indeed!
I like your description of the joy in freedom. I don’t drive, never have, so I feel that freedom when I get on the bus to go Somewhere Else.
(in my best Arkansas twang) I feel your gain.