Eventful Times II

So on Tuesday night a group of us said we would meet up, go to Leeds Trinity Kitchens and then visit the German Market after having dinner.

As usual I opted for Vietnamese because it is one of my favourite cuisines at the kitchens. We went back to where we were sitting, ate our meals, took a few group photographs; to remember everyone by before we all went our separate ways for the holidays and continued on to the Market.We got to the market and everyone had one thing they wanted to get before it closed. It was quite a small German Market when you compare it to the Manchester German Market, so I was quite underwhelmed. We made the rounds one and a half times before attempting to enter a bar where we were refused entry as some of the younger looking ones in the group didn’t have ID. We continued on having our own party as we left.

We decided to call it a night and the 9 of us split ourselves into two cars to head home.
We said our goodbyes and headed off in the direction of where our driver had parked. Down the first road.. No car. Then she realised she’d parked on the next street over! We got to the car, piled in and drove off.

After driving for about 15 minutes, we realised that the car was making a weird noise.. like a rough, deflated, flat tyre noise. We pulled over just before we joined onto the motorway. The driver got out of the car and started doing checks from her side. She got round to the front left tyre and let out a worrying “Oooh.” We knew it wasn’t good! She opened up the passenger door and informed us that we had a flat and we needed to get it to a service station. There was one roughly under two miles in the opposite direction of where we had come from, so very carefully we did a u-turn and headed back in the direction we came.
We got there and it was only when we got out of the car did we realise the extent of the damage. The tyre had actually popped and there were 3 tears in it! I’m surprised it got us as far as it did! The driver called her mum and we all danced around outside trying to warm up. The AA (recovery company) had been called to come and assist and their estimated time of arrival was an hour from when she had made the call, so we all headed into the service station to keep warm.

We got in there and made friends with Josh the attendant. He let us use the toilet, we bought drinks and magazines and the girls sat on the floor waiting for AA to show up. They arrived 20 minutes ahead of schedule and we all ran out excited that we’d be able to get on our way soon 🙂

Steve was amazing (AA recovery man)! He looked on at us crazily when we stood by the side of the car dancing, allowed us to started singing to him, changed our tyre, gave some words of advice, had a bit of banter and then sent us on our way. In total, we’d only added an extra hour onto our journey which didn’t seem too bad considering the circumstances.

It’s always an eventful time when the girls get together.. and Tuesday proved no different!

Steve even let us take a selfie with him! He was such a lovely man!

Moral of the story: Always carry a jack and lug wrench in the boot! I could have changed the tyre myself but our friend didn’t have these! I’m definitely a boy in the body of a girl.. I would never be stranded with a burst tyre.. Just saying! 😛