the one where the enterprise loses a warp engine
I had a great day at the beach yesterday. Stayed a little longer than usual cause the sunset was pretty fantastic.
I ended up cruising through Santa Ana via the 5 at a brisk 90 mph. I heard a pop and a sound like someone running on the lane dots. I kept looking out the side of the car and seeing if I could match the sound with a car. Every time I did, the car would turn off or change lanes away but the sound kept going. After a minute or so the “driving on dots sound” turned to a loud shredding rubber sound and suddenly I’m careening down the Interstate like an outtake from Tokyo Drift. Except substitute Santa Ana for Tokyo and controlled race drifting cool for sliding across four lanes while trying not to scream like a girl (which I succeeded in).
I managed to get over to the emergency lane unscathed and without causing an accident and settled into the just barely wide enough emergency lane. It’s a good thing no one needs these things for daily use cause they’re barely functional that narrow. I had to climb over to the passenger side to avoid having my driver side door taken off. Made it out by squeezing between the door and the guard rail and assessed the damage. The tire had been shredding like me and my snowboard on a half pipe… if I was good. I managed to get the car jacked up after watching it fall off the jack a few times. Rule 1… always set the parking brake. Everything worked much better after that. Got the car jacked up, changed out the tire and was back on the road in about 20 minutes.
I’ve always said that changing a flat was one of the top 10 things every man should be able to do. I just didn’t think that having cars fly by at 70 only inches away was a necessary part of the challenge.
Women SHOULD be able to do it too, and I attempted it with my last flat.
What I hadn’t counted on was the fact that the tires had been put on with a pneumatic drill, and it took a guy 100 pounds heavier (and a helluva lot stronger) than me to get the lug nuts off.
At least I wasn’t in traffic. 🙂
Peggy C
July 3, 2006 at 6:20 pm
yeah, that’s my only point is you have to be strong enough to get the lug nuts off andback on again. I had to kick the tire iron a few times to get each lugnut started.
arnold
July 3, 2006 at 8:14 pm
Favourite part:
The tire had been shredding like me and my snowboard on a half pipe if I was good.
Sorry to hear about your tire. Maybe if you stopped using them to smuggling cocaine across the border to sell to neighbourhood kids they would stop shredding.
curtis
July 4, 2006 at 8:04 am
Cause that’s bad, right? Yes. it’s bad.
arnold
July 4, 2006 at 8:04 am
Arnold! Oh my gosh! I am happy that you are still alive…Thank God for His hand of protection over you as you were doing the Tokyo Drift across traffic. It’s a good thing you are a “Tighteratops” and were able to have courage under fire (That’s Zac’s sentence obviously!).
Beth
July 4, 2006 at 4:57 pm
Glad you’re OK, too, Arnold. I was just thinking the other day that I need to learn how to change a tire, because you’re right, every man needs to know how to do that. Congrats. Hope the new tire wasn’t too much, though.
Cubby
July 5, 2006 at 7:41 am
Wasn’t bad at all, I replaced the whole set for a pretty good price!
arnold
July 5, 2006 at 9:21 am