Flat Tire

Everything was all planned perfectly. I’d get out of my apartment, leave work, load my last few items into the car and head up to school. Then I’d be all set for a free Friday to get all of my school stuff in order. And Comcast was all set to come at 8am and I’d be ready.

At least that was the plan. I went pretty crazy trying to get all of that in order to make Friday go perfectly. Then I’d have no worries for Janine & Kevin’s wedding and be all set for orientation to start on Monday.

Things were going even better than I hoped. My final walkthrough at my apartment went so quickly I was able to turn in my keys before heading back to work for my exit interview to turn in my badge. When I came out of work and saw a nail in my tire, I started to deflate. I knew I was stuck. I knew everything I had driven myself crazy to accomplish was a waste of time and worry. I got home and could hear the air coming out of the tire as it deflated in the driveway. I should have just taken it to the dealer, but I thought if I made it home, I wouldn’t have to worry about it and could make it up to school where it could be dealt with.

I had a flat with my last VW. My GLI had expensive tires so they talked me into it. It was so easy (and wound up being worth it) that I decided to do it again with my Tiguan. The one thing I knew was that the VW roadside no longer dealt with flats, but the tire warranty did. That’s what I was told.

I called up the tire warranty place and they were absolutely worthless. They just told me to call someone and get a receipt to submit. No no, this is not the simple I want. I’m not dealing with submitting any forms.

I called the dealer to see if I did put the spare on and got over there if they could fix it and get me on the road that night. It was already 4pm, so I didn’t have much hope. They called back and said do whatever I could to get it over there. Also, to just call roadside. I told her I didn’t think they did tires anymore, she disagreed.

I called VW Roadside. They were slightly more helpful. Telling me they could have someone out in an hour. Good enough. Oh, and it would cost over $60. Umm, what? I wasn’t too shocked by the fact there was a charge, but how much it was. The VW tire warranty covered the roadside up to $50. I told the lady it was crazy for VW to charge more than VW warranty was willing to pay. She put me on hold for a minute, then came back to tell me someone would be out in about an hour. No mention of my victory, but I’ll take free.

They guy did show up about an hour later and I quickly headed over to the dealer to get the tire taken care of. I went in, told them that I was the one that called. The guy was stumped. The other guy working remembered hearing something about it. Neither one of them were sure they even had the tire I needed. They took a look, and nope. Of course not. Whoever I talked to was just being nice and didn’t check. If they had the tire, I would have been good to go. Instead, they pointed me to Firestone a mile up the road, but didn’t give me much hope. Not only did Firestone not have the tire, they didn’t even have to look because they don’t even carry that brand.

I went right back to VW and gave up on all my hope. I told them I was leaving the car if they could guarantee it would be done on Friday. One of the mechanics jumped right on the phone to order the tire and came back to say it would be there in the morning.

I called home to get picked up. While waiting I called Comcast, hoping for a Saturday morning or Sunday install. They were all available when I had scheduled the original appointment, but of course, nothing was available now. School told us not to expect any time during the week to take care of this sort of thing. I reluctantly scheduled for the next Saturday and resigned myself to having no TV or internet for the next week.

When I got home Comcast called to confirm my Friday appointment. The one which I had just canceled. I hit the button to say the time was no good. The guy picked up and saw that I had in fact canceled. Now that I was home, I had my schedule for orientation and decided to attempt to squeeze them in Tuesday afternoon since it looked like I only had to be at school for 45 minutes (at any point in the day). At worst, I was back to Saturday, but hopefully Tuesday would work out.

Tuesday worked out, sorta, more on that later.

I made it up to my apartment on Friday night. Once my day was shot, it didn’t matter what time I arrived. The things I had wanted to do, I did manage to take care of Monday morning before I had to be at orientation. Those things were getting my new ID (my picture looks exactly the same as it did 9 years ago!) and a parking pass. Of course, in the afternoon, part of orientation was walking all over campus and taking care of those sorts of things. Not only did I have to go back to those places, there were now lines and I had to wait for my group members to get everything taken care of.

Not to worry, just a minor complaint. That day wasn’t so bad and later in the week things completely turned for the better.

I had stayed a night in my apartment the weekend before after we moved everything in. I moved the week before because I knew with the wedding it wouldn’t be possible to squeeze everything in and stay sane. Ahad helped and stayed over that night. Ahad also stayed for the wedding. When Ahad left on Sunday it was my first time alone in my apartment with a chance to start to make myself comfortable. I was approaching my first night alone when that was delayed.

My sister was driving home from a wedding in Pittsburgh and was having a rough time getting across the state via 80. She wasn’t going to get home until after midnight, if there was no more traffic/construction. Since I’m only 20 minutes off of 80, it was decided she should just come stay over and drive home in the morning. She didn’t spend as much time at Penn State in my 1st four years as she did this month. It all worked out and she was able to have lunch with our cousin before she left town.