Of tires, warranties and silver linings.

Tires are a problem for me.  Truly.  They are round.  They are rubber.  They are supposed to hold air.  I swear that every single tire on the RAV has an inner magnetic field that pulls every hunk of metal (including nails, screws, shards and chunks) toward the roundness that allows said vehicle to roll.

I was on my merry way home from work last night when 1 block up, I noticed that the tire pressure sensor light came on.  I admit that I am completely aware of exactly which light this is.  I work in not a terribly good section of town.  I decided to pull off to the local Thai restaurant, run around the car to see if all tires were round and if getting home without assistance was possible.  I went on the car roundabout and saw that my back passenger tire was low.  Visibly low.  The good news is that I didn't hear whistling of air pouring from the tire, so I thought that I could go and top off the air in the tire.  It was 26 F and perhaps it was a cold weather thing.

I went to the gas station where I thought there was a free air pump and it was not free.  It had a Visa or MC logo on the front, so I gassed up the 1/4 tank with the $2.88 in gas/gallon and used my handy-dandy tire gauge to assess the situation.

10 PSI.  That's not good.

I called Hubs and told him that I was certain that I picked something up and that I'd be parked in the neighbor's drive.  I then called Mike, who wasn't home at the time, but he told me his garage code and told us to help ourselves to tools.  In the change of 22 F, the zipper on the spare was frozen shut, so I ran back home, got a measuring cup of warmish but not hot water to loosen the zipper up.  Of course, I had no gloves on because I had to deal with water and by the time we got the tire changed, my hands were blocks of ice.  We did, however, find said metallic substance.

I could see into my tire.  I could see into the interior of my tire.  Hubs has no idea how I made it home.

God.  It's all God at work.  There is no other answer.

On his way to work, Hubs took the RAV to the fine, fine folks at NTB.  "Sir, we can't fix that."  They showed him that I picked up a 1" x 5-6" hunk of metal in my tire.  A bigger concern that they addressed with him was that my 70,000 mile tires had only 35,000 miles (ETA 31,000 miles) on them, but were essentially bald.  Hubs called and told me that NTB offered to switch the tires out with new 50,000 for $100 each as a part of the warranty.  Shoot, we've paid more than that for a single tire for the RAV, so I told him to go ahead and do it.  We also have road hazard (not an option) and an alignment for the bargain price of $530 ish right after giving a huge deposit towards phase one of braces.  HOORAY!  :S  We consider it a blessing to have an opportunity to replace crappy tires that were so very loud (the salesman asked if loudness was a problem) with tires that will hopefully be much better.  We are blessed to have an NTB on the way to Hubs' work and how fortunate for me to be off so that I could run out, drop Hubs off at work (a few minutes late, but they were okay with that) and run back out to do the family car shuffle tonight.

Bonus number two is that I was able to fill Hubs' tank before gas went from $2.86 to $3.29 right before my eyes.  I was sitting in line for gas and the price changed on the sign.  I got to the pump and it was still the previously stated price and I absolutely couldn't scan the credit card in fast enough to secure that price.  I got it, then right after I was done, they shut down my pump.  Wow.

We're fortunate to have the ability to replace tires and get gas for our cars.  The tires weren't built into the budget for now, but we have a savings and I'm glad to have it though we ignore it.  How fortunate we are to have them offer a warranty deal, even though I've been a bit remiss on rotation lately.  How lucky I'll be to have a car that isn't sliding anymore.  (Hubs said, "You were sliding, weren't you."  "Yes, but I didn't want to say anything right now.")  How great it is that Hubs could go to take care of this for me.  I don't pull the girl card often, but I was fearful that I might get the dumb girl run-around if I took the truck and gave a warranty complaint.  They brought it up to Hubs and all is well.  I've never had a problem with NTB.  They've always stood behind the products that they sell and they've always given great service.  Still, I'm glad that Hubs could handle this one for me.