It was cold today, real cold, toes cold all day kind of cold. I parked in the garage last night hoping that it wouldn’t take as long to heat up the car, luckily the she was nice and toasty by the time we hit E-470 on our drive to work. I have gotten into the habit of taking the toll road to work and then weaving my way around avoiding Arapahoe Rd on the way home. The roads weren’t too bad, slick but not awful. We usually get off at Quebec and then head north to Dry Creek, west on Dry Creek and north on Colorado to get to Karen’s, it’s a pretty easy drive. An easy drive unless you slide and end up in the open space on the side of Quebec that is.
Yes, you read that right, Clare and I ended up in the open space on the east side of Quebec just south of Dry Creek. I was merging into the left lane, to make my turn onto Dry Creek, when the car started to slide. I did my best to get my ice skate to go straight again, but she had other plans. We ended up sliding into the curb and then up onto the grass sliding some more and eventually ending up facing south in the grass. Clare didn’t make a peep the entire time.
After I gathered myself I called Jeff, who wasn’t up yet, and left a message telling him he needed to call me back ASAP and that we were in the open space. I got out of the car to check for damage, how she escaped without a scratch is beyond me, I suppose the short grass helped? It looked as though things were fine, so I figured why not see if I can get off the trail (I’m sure the parks crew would appreciate my thinking of the trail) and back onto the road. The car seemed able to go, so I waited for no traffic in either direction and gave it a whirl, I made it back onto the road! I called Jeff again, he answered this time, and told him that it seemed like maybe the alignment was messed up, he hadn’t listened to my message so he was rather confused, after telling him about my attempt at a triple sow cow his suggestion was to take the car to the Nissan dealer after I dropped of Clare. I hung up with Jeff and waited at the red light to turn left on Arapahoe (missed my turn onto Dry Creek), it wasn’t until I was ¾ thru the turn that I started to slide again. At this point I called Jeff back and told him I’d be in the Holly Pool parking lot, there was no way I could get to Karen’s.
AAA assured me that a tow truck would be out within the hour, Clare continued to nap and I chatted with a friend. Jeff finally arrived and took Clare to Karen’s, meanwhile James and his tow truck showed up. Luckily, Jeff came back as James was finishing loading my red ice skate on the truck; I quickly hopped out of his truck and into Jeff’s for the ride to Big O. Colin at Big O took my info and said he’d call when he knew what it needed and how much it would cost.
Jeff drove me to work, and went on to the Dome. I finally heard from Colin and nearly had a stroke when he told me how much work she needed. His first comment was that I needed new tires; the ones she has were ‘pretty much done’ and could have been the reason I slid in the first place. So, regardless of all that will be done she’ll be getting a spiffy new set of 18inch ‘bologna skins.’ I’m hoping that she’ll be fixed up and ready to go by Wednesday evening or Thursday afternoon at the latest.
All in all it was an eventful morning. I don’t care to have another drive to work like this, but as far as accidents go we got pretty lucky. Clare was a champ; she didn’t make a peep and waited very patiently. Immediately after we came to a stop I asked if she was OK, of course she didn’t answer me. When I got out of the car to check things out she just looked at me like ‘are we there yet?’ I’m sorry that Clare was in the car, but happy she wasn’t injured. I know she’ll never remember this morning, but I wish it hadn’t happened. When we picked her up after work and she was so happy to see us, her smile when we walked in the door made my bad day better.
Tomorrow the weather is supposed to be colder than it was today. I haven’t decided just what Clare will wear tomorrow, but the fleece-lined jeans will be involved for sure. The forecast for the weekend is much better, 40’s and partly sunny. I took a picture of the thermostat in the car before our little incident, while stopped at a stoplight, it does read negative temperatures.
While the weather heads east I hope that everyone stays safe and has some good bologna skins, I wouldn’t want anyone else to end up like we did this morning.
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