GoodYear

WOOOSH.

It's never a sound you want to hear when exiting your car. Mom thought the neighbors had a gas leak. Or a water leak. Or a something leak. That is, until she realized the leak was the car.

There may have been some leaking of the eyes the next hour. I think Mom was feeling a little dejected. Or rejected. One of the 2.

One moment* of OhBother, OhGeez, OhCrap: free

One negotiation of handling-the-Dad's-territory-but-he's-out-of-town-crisis: can you put a price on the inevitable?

One friendly neighbor: free**

One giant screw in the tire: $179

Me at the GoodYear Store: Priceless***.

What better way to spend a rainy Saturday, right? At least it wasn't raining on Friday during the tire change part. Mom was at step 7 before she realized that she might need "adult supervision." It's probably a good thing she doesn't have that much first hand knowledge of tire changing. The manual actually leaves out a couple key steps, so thank goodness for neighbors.

* it may have been more than a moment. Though it did only take the tire about 2 minutes to deflate to the level of pancake. Nothing slow about this leak, folks.

**there may be some beer involved. Hey, it's New Orleans. And it's Mardi Gras. We serve beer after road races, so the involvement of beer shouldn't come as a surprise.