Friday, June 26, 2009

Disaster Strikes at the Grocery Store

So this evening I decided I had put off grocery shopping too long and I had to get stuff for our Sunday dinner. I loaded up three already grumpy children and headed off to the closest grocery store. Walmart is where we normally go, but it was too far away for my mood and my extremely angry one year old, so I opted for the closer, but more expensive, Reams. Three children is always hard when shopping even when they're not angry bears. But today seemed to be even more dreadful. Fighting in the race car cart, kicking, shoving, biting, the works. Sweet precious baby David screaming at me for who knows what reason. I'm already close to tears and feeling so overwhelmed. So I quickly finished the shopping, practically running up the aisles. Get out to the car and load groceries then quickly strap kids in. As I was pulling out of my spot, I thought the wheel felt really hard to turn and there was a loud grating noise. So I stopped, pulled back into my space and got out to investigate. My tire had completely exploded and I was driving on the rim. I mean shredded, blown out tire. I have no idea how it happened. I am not completely unobservant and dimwitted, but I have no idea when or how it happened. We got to the store fine enough. We cancelled our AAA and I have not changed a tire since I was required to in Driver's Ed when I was 16. I didn't even know where the jack or the spare donut tire was, or if they even existed at all. I have one ward member and neighbor's phone number programmed into my cell. Nobody answered. So I called Greg at work and asked him to (illegally) look in the pharmacy's database and find some phone numbers of neighbors that I can call. I tried 5 and no one was home on a Friday night. Figures. So I sat and tried very hard not to cry. I had bought some marshmallows, so I opened them and fed them to the kids. David was hysterically crying and clawing at his car seat straps to get out and my ice cream melted all over the sack and the floor. I finally got a hold of one of the people who hadn't answered the first time I called and the husband said he'd be right out. He came and brought his father in law and the two of them located all the necessary things that I failed to find. They put the spare donut on and lowered the car down from the jack, only to tell me that the donut was flat. They told me to drive it anyway and slowly follow them to their house where they had an air compressor and could fill the tire up for me. Which they did. I finally got home, put groceries away and got the kids in bed. I need some chocolate in the worst way. Or else a major sleeping pill. Spare donut tire is already flat again in the garage. But that's a problem for another day.

2 comments:

Tara said...

Oh Karen, I'm so sorry. That sounds totally horrible! I'm glad that someone was able to help you with the tire. I'm hoping your next trip goes better - either going without kids or having Greg pick up the shopping duties :)

Amber said...

Oh that is so sad. I would have lost it completely. And just FYI. You can always call AAA and reinstate you membership with them. I had to do that once. Our membership expired and I had a flat. I just had to pay the renewal over the phone and they sent someone out.