Adventure!Excitement! Hot Asphalt! Sweat!

Well, or something very similar happened to me this morning. I am toodling on Beltline towards work, listening to my iPod and getting frustrated with how the radio station I was tuning the converter to was kinda full of back noise, when suddenly there is this REALLY LOUD NOISE coming from somewhere underneath the car...I think first'wow, that old car next to me is sure having engine problems' ten I realize it's not on that side, it's towards my front and left, and that the Saturn is REALLY HARD to steer...
Yup. Tire.
Hazards on.
I managed to limp (in morning traffic) to the left turn lane at the intersection of Beltline and the Bush Turnpike/ 161 (aka The Kuwaiti Border as we affectionately call it), pull over, kill the iPod, kill ignition, keep hazards on, fish cellphone out, find the home # on autodial and alert The Husband what happened. Meanwhile, the delayed stress reaction set in and shaking of voice and hands commenced almost on schedule. Brain started to shut down too, but still managed to, while waiting for him to show up (lucky I was close to home and that he was not working) call work and leave a voicemail to my coworker letting her know I'll be in late.
Then The Husband showed up (after I got two cars stopping and asking if I needed help, which is very reassuring) and announced that I will have to change the tire myself, and he'll instruct and supervise, because, as he very correctly put it: "you'll need to learn this".
That did NOT make me thinking any better, or being very charitable towards him as I struggled with the jack that is JUST a bit too short--good thing it is Friday and I was wearing jeans--or being unable to get the tire caps off with my 139 pounds of body weight and poor balance.
Meanwhile, The Husband is sitting next to me, giving instructions while I am half on the ground, half crouching, trying to jack lift the car /tire in the air, relatively sure that this does NOT look good for all those driving by, seeing the woman sweating on the hot asphalt while the man next to her sits there in his stylish sunglasses and gives her instructions...:-)
Well, he was patient and I calmed down as we worked out the kinks in how he communicates when he wants to teach something versus how I want to be taught when I do something the first time...so the tire got taken off, the donut from the bottom of the trunk got put on, I got educated in the mysteries of which order to unscrew/screw back tire screws...and in about 40 minutes, we could swap keys and I could head to work in the Jeep while he limped the Saturn to the dealership to tell them the tire they JUST changed four months ago had spontaneously exploded into bits (no really, you could see the thread failure almost halfway across the tire surface). Funny I've just seen a feature on TV yesterday about totally faulty Chinese import Firestone tires--guess what kind of tire our car is having? We were sitting in the lunchroom with some coworkers yesterday watching this, and one of them says: "I swear, they try to kill us..."
Well, they tried this morning--but I am still here. Disheveled, sweaty and in a ruined shirt, getting ready to head down to the company gym to shower and change into a promotional company shirt I found in our storage room (XXL but hey...)--and finally arriving to the club of women who know how to change a car tire.

::tiny little sounds of whee!::


UPDATE at 11:55: This is unbelievable--The Husband is STILL sitting at the friggin'dealership waiting for a TIRE to be DELIVERED...AAARGH!! Needless to say, my confidence in them is just a tad shaken right now. Not a good day this far, and I am having more delayed stress reaction here with more shaking.