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September began with us in Edmonton with Paul working at a turnaround of a petrochemical plant forty-five minutes from our daughter and son-in-law’s home. This turnaround began in August. It was nominally scheduled to run into October. It did timewise, but the scope of the planned jobs shrunk with each passing week. Much like people discard items from their shopping carts as they approach the checkout, things and people were dropped in odd places. As one of the higher paid people on the crew my last day was on September 21st. My financial needs were more than met in the time before I was laid off. Anticipated icing didn’t happen. That was a trade off with suddenly having my life back and not getting up before five, six days a week to get home after six in the evenings.
It did not drop me into despair, but into the aimless world of the retired without schedules or deadlines. There must be a solution for that other than employment or death. Haven’t found it yet. Keep meaning to look. I recently bought a book on procrastination. I mean to get around to reading it.
We had two vehicles with us. Usually, I drove the car to work. When Juanita went back to Meadow Lake for a few days I drove the truck. That left the dually for her city errands. She didn’t do many.
The plant parking lot at quitting time was busy. Cars bunched up at the stop sign getting onto the highway. All you could see is the back of the car immediately ahead of you. One evening I drove over something with both wheels. About six kilometers later alarms started on the dash of two tires dropping in pressure. Rather than turning where I normally would I carried on to Gibbons amid increasingly urgent alarms. I parked in a strip mall and got out to look. Both tires on the driver’s side still looked okay but air was coming out. Before long both were all the way flat.
I phoned roadside assistance. They said it would be a couple of hours before help arrived. That seemed too long so I phoned service shops that were open. All were to busy to help that evening. Eventually I called the roadside assistance back. The person said she hadn’t had a call for two flats on the same vehicle for a couple of years but had had four calls that evening. We agreed they would tow the car to the selling dealer and where to leave the key for the tow truck driver. Becky came and picked me up.
I drove the truck to work the next day. On the way into the parking lot I pulled to one side and got out. There was a GMC mudflap still lying there. It had several sheet metal screws sticking up out of it. I picked it up off the road and dropped it off at the guard house.
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