Tuesday, November 11, 2003 :::
As my personal life goes, the good news from Sunday evening is that it turns out I'm capable of changing a tire, eventually. Loosen the nuts before you lift the vehicle; that occurred to me as soon as I tried to loosen them with the vehicle raised. A patrolman who came by while I was raising the car seemed to know I had done this wrong, but was perfectly willing to let me figure it out myself.If you're ever wondering how demoralizing it is to have the spare go flat as the patrolman is pulling around the curve and out of sight, the answer to that is "very". I got one of his colleagues, who called a fellow named Tony who brought a tow truck and a compressor; indicating that spare tires unused for a while sometimes behave this way, he first tried inflating the tire — no luck — and then doing so after elevating the vehicle again, so it wasn't resting on the tire until the tire was inflated. That actually worked, and Tony refused payment, even in the form of apples or grandma-made cookies.
So yesterday I called a phone number that I got from a sign across the street from me; there happens to be an automotive tire center right there. I drove my car over there this morning, and called the same number; it turns out the phone number is no longer attached to that place, but instead is now the phone number of another car place several suburbs away, and for some reason they have an out-of-date sign on their property. I've never had a wrong number and discovered it after having a conversation and a half with the wrong guy. Fortunately I was able to acquire the phone number of someone who, when called, had seen my car; it sounds like some progress is being made.
Anyway, I've been taking the bus to the train station yesterday and today, and have been unable to take stuff from my old apartment to my new one. Hopefully I get the car back tomorrow and accelerate my efforts.
::: posted by dWj at 2:05 PM
