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Sep 16 2003
Last week started dramatically enough with a wail from my dying hard drive. A wail that meant I had shamefully let a couple of projects ride without backup for a few weeks and probability was arriving early to collect. Fortunately for me, Walter also arrived with a suitable adapter and a more than suitable patience to mount my rapidly decaying drive on his desktop and save whatever divine providence was willing to give. In the meantime, I stubbornly reworked one of the projects completing the full two weeks worth of catch up work in about 8 hours, which makes me wonder how I can claim those two weeks were productive. I guess everything would go that fast if I were working completely from memory.
Next in the line of disorder, Das Auto informed me that he was in need of some new shoes. This I already knew, but had been avoiding since he wears very expensive shoes. However, when you start to see the tread wear indicators flattening on the top and you sense that there is a divine conspiracy afoot to make you wail like your lost hard drive, it is more a time for acquiescence than stubborn resistance. Working with some good recommendations, I took to tirerack.com to find Das Auto a suitable set of paws. The Tire Rack is apparently where all the cool kids are buying tires these days. Most cool kids are having their newly purchased tires drop shipped to their dealer; my dealer does not serve the whims of cool kids and, of course, I believed the smiling service consultant when he told me that throwing four 17” tires into the trunk of an Audi A4 would be easy. In case it comes up at trivia night, an Audi A4 will only hold one 17” tire in its trunk. The other three can be cleverly wedged into the center of the back seat and the passenger seat. A sunroof, however, is required as you car will reek of soft compound rubber. After a less than comfortable ride home, I unloaded the rubbery payload into the living room. I was afraid to leave them on the porch since they are pretty expensive tires. So until Wednesday, I have four Pirelli PZero Nero’s sitting at the bottom of my stairs giving off that pungent, and probably toxic, new tire smell. I will, of course, sing the virtues of drop shipping to spatially impaired service consultant on Wednesday, but not before I load up all four of those tires back into Das Auto and head over for the installation.