Tired Old Routine

Am I the only one who gets annoyed with the TPMS on vehicles these days? If you are unfamiliar with the term, TPMS stands for Tire Pressure Monitoring System. It’s the little light on the dash that lets you know if you have a low or flat tire.

In theory, I suppose such a system is a good idea. Although, I’m not sure what was wrong with the old system we had—that being, look at your tires! It’s pretty obvious if you have a low tire—particularly if it’s flat! Or, even if you are driving, a sudden loss of air in one tire (or more) is fairly easy to figure out.

But the powers that be have decided we all need a monitoring system. That wouldn’t be so bad if the thing actually worked properly. But sadly, they do not always do that. For example, my pickup routinely tells me I have a low tire. I used to actually check the pressure, trying to find which one was low—and there weren’t any. So, I learned to ignore the light. Eventually, it goes off. But then a few days later, it’ll come back on. And again, I ignore it.

So, this past week when the light came on, I didn’t really see any cause for concern—not until one morning when I noticed the left rear tire seemed to be awfully low on air. I aired up the tire and went to work. But the next day, it was nearly flat again.

So, I took it to the tire shop. I happened to mention all this to a guy later in the day and he said, “That’s why we have the TPMS, you shouldn’t ignore it when the light comes on.”

Right. I wonder if he’s ever heard of the boy who cried wolf? That’s what the TPMS is like to me. It’s cried wolf so much that I don’t pay any attention when there is a real problem.

I told the guy, “TPMS is pretty much worthless.”

Of course, he didn’t agree.

“Think about it,” I said. “I guarantee that in the days before TPMS, not a single instance can be found of someone not knowing they had a flat—not for very long anyway. And every single flat or blowout still got fixed... eventually.” ~

Bruce A. Borders is the author of more than a dozen books, including: Inside Room 913, Over My Dead Body, The Journey, Miscarriage Of Justice, The Lana Denae Mysteries, and The Wynn Garrett Series. Available in ebook at www.amazon.com/Bruce-A.-Borders/e/B006SOLWQS and paperback on Amazon, Barnes & Noble and Books-a-Million.

Traffic Revision Ahead

Traffic cones are like an obstacle course for truck drivers. Or a competency test. At times, it’s a challenge, to miss them. But it’s kind of fun too. Non-truck drivers generally place the cones on the road and sometimes they leave enough room for a truck to negotiate a turn and sometimes they do not. Usually, it’s the latter.

As a truck driver, when I encounter traffic cones, I like to see if I can get my truck through without knocking any over. Just because I like a challenge. However, once I determine that there simply isn’t enough room, the game changes to something like bowling—it’s time to see how many cones I can take out!

But, if the cones are on the freeway, that’s a different story. Hitting anything, even a small rubberized plastic traffic cone is not advisable. At freeway speeds, those little cones become very destructive. So, I try NOT to hit the cones on the freeway. That doesn’t always work.

Last week, I was driving through the construction. The freeway was down to one lane, with cones set up to keep vehicles out of the work area. But someone had felt it necessary to run over quite a number of cones, scattering them all over the road. By the time they showed up in my headlights, it wasn’t really feasible to stop. I tried to dodge them the best I could but there were too many. A single lane, and no shoulder didn’t help matters any. I ended up hitting at least two of them.

I’d barely made it out of the construction when my warning light and buzzer were going off. I was losing air. After pulling over, I saw that one of the cones had taken out an airline to my brakes. The brake had tried to lock up but all it succeeded in doing was heating up the brake and wheel. By the time I’d gotten stopped, the wheel was glowing red-hot.

I called our mechanic and he came out to fix the truck. In a little over an hour I was on my way. Not bad. In fact, not near as bad as the guy who I assume was the one to originally hit the cones. His car was still there on the side of the road the next day—missing a bumper and a flat tire. Glad I was driving a truck! ~

Bruce A. Borders is the author of more than a dozen books, including: Inside Room 913, Over My Dead Body, The Journey, Miscarriage Of Justice, The Lana Denae Mysteries, and The Wynn Garrett Series. Available in ebook at www.amazon.com/Bruce-A.-Borders/e/B006SOLWQS and paperback on Amazon, Barnes & Noble and Books-a-Million.

Am I Missing Something?

Enjoyed a week long vacation last week. Yay! No exotic destination though. In fact, for most of the week, I just stayed home. Did some work on my fence and deck, along with a few other things.

But as a truck driver, I can’t fathom going more than a few days without some extended periods of driving. On Thursday, my wife and I traveled roughly 300 miles—just to have lunch! Then on Friday, I left my wife home while I made a quick weekend trip to my son’s house in Idaho. And since there are always things to do, I helped him with some of his home-related projects.

My stay lasted through Sunday, which meant I was away from my wife for Mothers’ Day. For the past 30 years or so, I’ve taken her, and usually the kids, out to eat on Mothers’ Day. But this year, I wasn’t home. When I made plans to be gone, I hadn’t realized it would be Mothers’ Day weekend. Thankfullly, one of my daughters was able to step in and take her mother for a nice lunch.

But that didn’t mean I had to go hungry. Nope. On Sunday, my son and I, just the two of us, went out to eat—for Mothers’ Day. Hey, it was still Mothers’ Day! Just because neither one of us are mothers doesn’t mean we can’t have a decent meal!

For some reason though, the manager, who was randomly handing out roses, skipped our table! And we didn’t even get the discount they were offering to nearly everyone else! We still had a good Mothers’ Day though! ~

Bruce A. Borders is the author of more than a dozen books, including: Inside Room 913, Over My Dead Body, The Journey, Miscarriage Of Justice, The Lana Denae Mysteries, and The Wynn Garrett Series. Available in ebook at www.amazon.com/Bruce-A.-Borders/e/B006SOLWQS and paperback on Amazon, Barnes & Noble and Books-a-Million. 

A Balancing Act

So, a couple of my grandchildren learned to ride a bike this past week. They both seemed pretty excited about it—as we all were. It’s hard work teaching, or attempting to teach, such things. Hard on the back to be more specific. Not that I’m complaining because my part was pretty small. Others did a lot more training than I.

Before either of them had mastered the task, we were working on their skills one day and as we took a short break, I decided to take one of the bikes for a little spin. The grandkids looked at me in utter disbelief. “Grandpa knows how to ride a bike?”

“Well, yeah,” I said. “Why is that so strange?”

One of them—the youngest one, a four-year-old—answered without hesitation. “Because you’re old.” Nothing like coming right out and saying it! I could tell the other grandchild agreed but he was too nice to actually say it.

I stopped riding and told them, “Well I wasn’t always old, you know. And I learned to ride a bike when I was a kid.”

“But that was a long time ago!” The oldest one was still content to let the younger one do the talking, but both of them wore the look that said they couldn’t believe I could really ride a bike.

“It definitely was a long time ago,” I agreed.

Neither one said anything for a minute or so, then the youngest says, “And you still know how?”

“Of course I do. Did you think I’d forget?”

He nodded.

I said, “Well, that’s the thing about riding a bicycle, it’s like, well, riding a bicycle.” Figuring he’d never heard the saying, of something being compared to riding a bike, I thought I’d maybe have to explain my statement.

But before I could, the ever-philosophical four-year-old, with just a hint of disgust said, “Grandpa, riding a bicycle isn’t LIKE riding a bicycle, it IS riding a bicycle.”

“You’re right,” I told him. I again started to explain I was just using the saying to be silly and tell him what it meant.

He interrupted. “It means when I learn how to ride a bike, I won’t forget.”

Um, yeah. That. Sometimes I wonder if my grandkids really need me for anything. Well, maybe to help them learn to ride a bike, I guess. ~

Bruce A. Borders is the author of more than a dozen books, including: Inside Room 913, Over My Dead Body, The Journey, Miscarriage Of Justice, The Lana Denae Mysteries, and The Wynn Garrett Series. Available in ebook at www.amazon.com/Bruce-A.-Borders/e/B006SOLWQS and paperback on Amazon, Barnes & Noble and Books-a-Million.