I’m a big fan of learning. I love learning new things. However, some things I’d just like to hear about rather than experience.

This morning, ready to face a busy and challenging day, I headed out the door. Today was different than other days. Larry and I had coordinated Walker transportation — I’d take him and Larry would pick him up as I’m presenting recommendations for off-shoring web development to India for some Adobe products. Excited about what the day would bring, we approached the little grey Scion XA and Larry noticed both curb-side tires were flat. Now, not flat, but FLAT. And this is a problem because I’d needed my car to go to work and Larry needed his car to pick up the Little Man. The Scion is also blocking the driveway. Larry immediately taked charge and moved the Scion back and told me to take the Honda to work. “I’ll take care of it,” he said, with authority. I handed him our AAA card. He looked at me with amusement.

As I blithely went off to work, Larry got busy going to Kragan to purchase an air compressor. Larry conducted a test to see if we had leaks or if it was someone just releasing the air (wishful thinking). It only took 30 minutes for the recently fully inflated tires to become FLAT. So we all know we do what we do best and Larry called me to figure out where to take iPod Jack (the name of our Scion) to get the tires fixed. As the places I usually go are across the city and the tires won’t make it that far, we consulted Yelp and find Paul’s Battery and Tire Company at Geary and 10th (which is about 5 miles away from the house). Larry pumped up the tires again and took the car to get it fixed. It is going to take a few hours to repair the tires and Larry isn’t dressed to wait in the cold fog. He purchased a new vest (which is better than the alternative which was also considered — renting a hotel room near the garage. Larry goes home for a few moments and in a short time is able to use Facebook to connect with a Hollywood friend who likes Astronauts in Trouble (yay!). I chatted with Larry and I asked him what he wants for dinner since he should have anything he wants since he’s spending the day to deal with FLAT tires. “Nothing in particular,” he responds.

Larry slogged back to Paul’s to pick up the car (now costing $200+vest+compressor) and pick up Walker, allowing me to present a strategy for off-shoring marketing to India (the presentation went well, thank you). I arrived home to a clean car with two new tires. The guy from Paul’s tells us something only a tire guy would know — between Halloween and Thanksgiving, there’s a prejudice against black cars (our dark grey car looks black at night). Neighborhood punks decide to futz with black cars. This year they punctured my tires with a Phillips head screwdriver. Last year they stole my Scion logo. We’re two-for-two. So, while interesting that there’s some random car hatred associated with color and dates on a calendar, I would have preferred to learn that in a random conversational snippet than through experience — paying $300+ for tires, transportation, vests, and elaborate dinners.

Did I mention that Best Husband Ever decided he did (after all) want Good Dinner as a reward for the harrowing day and after Little Dude went to bed, we had Dungeness Crab and white wine? And as I write this, he’s doing dishes.

Best Husband Ever.