December 27, 2000
Dear Everyone:
Happy New Year!!!
This is It.
The last Letter of the 20th Century.
Sorry about no Letter last week.
I was on vacation (although I still wound up spending nearly
three hours at the office, even though I wasn’t supposed to be there).
Not much of an excuse for not writing, but it’s the best I can do
at such short notice.
Anyway.
Here I was beginning to think that we were going to
get all the way through Christmas this year without the traditional
Christmas Disaster. But
yesterday took care of that.
Yesterday, just as I was getting ready to drive up to “Jeannie’s” place,
I discovered that my left rear tire was very, very flat on the bottom.
(Looking on the bright side, at least it happened
the day after Christmas and
not Christmas morning!) I
called “Jeannie” and left a message that I was going to be late
(everyone was out shopping at the time).
Then I called
AAA and the tow truck arrived in about 20 minutes.
Took the nice tow truck man less than 10 minutes to replace the
flat tire with the tiny spare from the trunk.
While I waited for that, I dug through my files and actually
found the receipt and warranty from “Big
O Tires” that indicated that whatever the problem was, they would
take care of it.
So off I went to “Big O Tires” in
Dublin,
taking care to stay off the freeway.
Technically, you’re not supposed to go over 25 mph on one of
those tiny spare tires. Gave
the paperwork to the “Big O Tires” guy behind the counter who said
they’d take care of it in about 90 minutes.
That gave me plenty of time to fetch a book from the car and walk
over to one of three fast food places all on the same corner and have
lunch. I even took some mail
around the corner to the Post Office.
I also called “Jeannie” (costs 65¢ to call Concord from Dublin)
and actually talked to a live person (i.e., “Jeannie”), explaining that
I was going to be late.
Then I came back to “Big O Tires” with only about
15 minutes left to wait for my car.
I proceeded to read
Shakespeare
for Dummies,
an excellent book that I had picked up in
Ashland a
couple of years ago and have been reading off and on ever since.
(One of the things that makes it such an excellent book is that
you can put it down, then pick it up again weeks, or even months, later
and not have forgotten who half the characters are.)
The “Big O Tires” people were very busy that day.
The place looked like an ER with so many people coming and going.
And I suspect most of those people were there because they had to
be (like me). After all, who
decides to get their tires rotated the day after Christmas?
So it’s rather understandable that the “Big O Tires” people would
be a little off on their time estimation.
But two hours is more than “a little off”.
I read the 2-3 page synopses of
all the Comedies (including
Troilus and
Cressida which, technically is a “comedy” because no one of great
importance is killed). Then
I read all of the Histories.
By this time the nice guy behind the counter was beginning to
notice that I had been sitting there for quite some time (and reading
Shakespeare for Dummies, no
less) and asked someone to check on my car.
They came back shortly to announce that my car was the very next
in line to be worked on.
I had just started to make a dent in the Tragedies
when the counter man called to me (we were on a first name basis by this
time) that I was “free to go.”
The tire had picked up a nail and had either been repaired or
(more likely) replaced, no charge.
The whole thing cost me 65¢, period.
So, as Christmas Crises go, this one was fairly
mild. I only missed out on
spending the afternoon and evening with Mother, “Marshall”, “Jeannie”,
“Alice” and her husband, “Kelly”, and their two little girls “Park” (age
6) and “Ramsey” (3). And I’d
already spent the whole day before with all of them.
Come to think of it, “Big O Tires” may actually have been quieter
than “Jeannie’s” place on Tuesday.
And I’m getting closer to finishing
Shakespeare for Dummies.
Hope everyone has a great last
New Year’s Eve
of this millennium and a fun New Year’s Day of the next
millennium.
Love, as always,
Pete
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