One of those (expensive) days... Day 1297 (Year 4, Day 202)

Williamsburg, VA

First, it should be noted, that Mitch has been off of work most of this week due to the snow we had, then ice, then everything being too wet for the equipment to work properly (yes, at least he's still getting paid, and I'm getting to see what it will be like someday when we're both under the same roof 24/7!!!  No comment, 😀).

Mitch attempted to go to work this morning (he always leaves between 5:30 and 6:00 am).  The road to the highway is a narrow, 2 lane road with a lot of curves - for about 2 miles.  There was a car coming from the opposite direction, going way too fast and appeared (in the dark) to be over the divider.  As a knee-jerk reaction, Mitch swerved right to avoid being hit.  Unfortunately, to his right, was a deep ditch.  This is how Mitch landed in a very muddy ditch (note the 45 degree angle):



Fortunately, he wasn't hurt and there didn't appear to be any damage to the truck. He called a towing company to pull him out.  Fortunately, it was another called off day at work due to conditions still being too wet, so he saved having to travel 60 miles round trip to find that out (like he did for the past 2 days).

Anyway, he was home for a bit.  We needed some groceries and my work load was on the light side, so I decided to join him on a trip to the supermarket at 11:30 am.

He fell into the ditch about a mile from the campground.  I drove, and he asked me to stop -- to pull into the nearest side street -- so he could attempt to find the tire sensor that came off in the mud (he looked and decided to forego it as there was just too much mud and he'd never find it; just need to buy another $50 replacement).  Anyway, he got back into the truck, I turned the corner, and heard a loud POP -- the front passenger tire blew out.  Probably had something to do with the earlier accident.

We were on a residential street and were able to pull over in front of someone's house.  Apparently, the owners were home and heard the pop, and came out to investigate.  Now, we have a spare tire but we keep it in the the basement of the rig as there's no room in the truck.  It's a good, full sized tire (not an emergency one).  The gentleman from the house graciously offered to give Mitch a ride back to the trailer to get the tire so roadside assistance could just switch it out instead of us having to get a tow to somewhere (THERE ARE STILL LOTS OF GOOD PEOPLE OUT THERE!!!).

Anyway, it took about an hour, but the company finally came and switched the tires.  We drove to the closest supermarket.  When we went above 20 mph, the truck shook like crazy.  No clue why.  However... knowing that there's heavy rain in the forecast for tomorrow, Mitch suspects there's a 99% chance he won't be working again. He made an appointment for a local diesel mechanic to do our oil/filter change (our neighbor, Nancy, will drive him to/fro).  We will purchase a new tire from them and have them check out why the vibrations (may have something to do with the settings for 4 wheel drive?  It only started once the tire was changed).

Oh - about the title - expensive because instead of calling either one of 2 of our roadside assistance plans this morning, Mitch found a local towing company and had them pull him out.  Not covered if there's no pre-authorization.  His rationale was that they could come out immediately so he could return to work, rather than wait 1++ hours for somewhere else to be dispatched.

We returned from shopping around 3:00 pm.  When Mitch had to get the tire, it required removing pretty much everything from the basement.  He spent the rest of the afternoon not only trying to put everything back, but also taking out our power washer and trying to get all the mud and leaves off the truck.

As I said... what a day!!!