Tire Rolling
So around the time a young, semi independent Tibs was living in the Banker’s Hill section of San Diego, he had a situation. The situation involved Eileen, my 1977 Buick LeSabre. This lumbering behemoth of steel and velour had itself a big old flat tire. The spare was flat as well it seemed, so Tibs was faced with a dilemma of getting the tire to a repair shop to get it fixed. For most normal people, this would not be much of a concern: take it to the closest automotive repair center and have them patch it. For a young Tibs who had recently lost his mind after breaking up with his girlfriend, it turned into a daunting all day affair involving a 2 mile trip and several knocked over garbage cans.
I had about 12 dollars to my name at this time. My shitty job working at Border’s came to a “unfortunate” end and I had spent the last of my dollar bills on some Carne Asada fries at Papas n Tacos. So i loaded up my pockets full of about 8 pounds of change and sauntered over to the Buick to remove the tire. Once it was removed, I was faced with the mind boggling situation people live in fear of having to make: Where can I get my tire fixed?. Now, about 100 ft down the road STARING at me in the face was a car shop. Next to it was another. Then there were the several other car shops just down the road. I however employed logic usually only designated to mentally retarded adults and dwarfs with learning disorders, I decided to travel downtown to the tire shop located in a very busy area of the city. Let us break down the logistics of this trip:
- From point A to point B it was roughly 2 miles.
- The trip was down a VERY steep hill most of the trip and then up a very steep hill at the end of the trip.
- The path would take me through the business district during the lunch hour of most normal working people.
- The tire had incredibly heavy rims that must have weighed at least 40 pounds.
- My pants were sagging from the 8 pounds of loose change i used to pay for the tire
- The road was slicked form the previous nights rain
- I would be ROLLING the tire, not taking a cab.
- THERE WAS A FUCKING CAR REPAIR SHOP DOWN THE ROAD!
So I decided to roll the damn tire down the hill and take it to the tire place. It was roughly 10AM on a gloomy day post a big rain the night before. My pockets jingling with change and sagging due to the sheer weight of the coin (mostly nickles) I began the slow, controlled roll down the block. At first it was grueling and slow moving as I had to eccentrically control the tire from slipping away. Then I got the great idea that hey, I could just roll it and jog besides it like a little kid with a hoop and stick! Now there is a plan that CANT fail! So now imagine a 20 something, jew-fro having, glasses wearing, saggy pants wearing, coin jingling man jogging down the street half bent over rolling a massive tire down the hill. I even saw a few bums snickering at me from the safety of their urine soaked cardboard boxes!
This plan was actually working well…until the slope began to increase and the tires acceleration increased exponentially. This point in the hill also coincided with the greatest density of people outside of their cars/homes/business. Lets take a look at a simple mathematical equation here to explain what happens next. If you take the slope of the hill and multiply it by the radius of the tire x its weight THEN subtract the coefficient of friction from the slippery road you will get the value of the moving tire. According to Slautzburg’s 5th law of Incompetence: A rolling object will move faster than the out of shape dork chasing it. Therefore the answer to this equation is that the tire took the fuck off and I ended up slipping on the wet cement only to watch the tire rocket down 5th avenue AGAINST traffic. Onlookers stood in shear amazement as I began to scramble at it with little to no concern for my own health as I had to race into traffic and haul the tire out of the oncoming traffic after it slammed into a telephone pole across the street.
At this point I was about halfway there and there was no turning back. I picked up the tire again and began what would be a series of short controlled rolls followed by the inevitable crash into a set of garbage cans, wall of a building, or the occasional crusty homeless man. Eventually the hill petered out and I began the overwhelming task of now rolling the tire up A st. to the tire shop. this 1/2 mile uphill cruise took me about an hour as every time i tried to roll it up, it rolled back half the distance. Eventually i made it the tire shop, beaten, fatigued, and coated in sidewalk scum from my fall. The man at the shop fixed the tire for 10 dollars and sent me on my way. The way home I ended up taking the trolley halfway back before rolling the last mile UP THE HILL again! I ended up stopping to sit almost every block, a mixture of sulking and anger that my ex -gf wasnt around to drive my ass around! WELL I SHOWED HER DIDNT I!!!!!!!!!!!!
So that is the story of a young, stupid, stubborn, determined, asinine man who rolled a tire out of his way just to prove his independence. Or maybe he did it because he was an asshole and just didnt think to go to the car shop across the street. Either case, he had a hell of a fro going!