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A Road Trip and an Anonymous Hero

HeartLast weekend we drove from Atlanta to New York in a full day and a half. I tried to log all of it but the battery on my device died (of boredom). No just kidding, it was fun we listened to audio books almost the entire time. You can see the heartrate from the trip. It generally went down as the hours on the road went on and on. I've annotated it with rest stops, and a freak flat tire event.

Map: http://maps.google.com/maps?q=http://trail.motionbased.com/trail/kml/episode.kml?episodePkValues=1142806
Picture 2-7

As we pulled into an off-the-beaten-path hi-way exit we suddenly got a flat tire :((
I was both helpless and useless in the situation. I felt like some strange cripple from the future who only had use of one limb, which was attached to a cellphone and could only be used to call an "emergency road side service."

The emergency road side service wanted to tow my car to the nearest tire-shop and i'd have to buy a new tire there. It felt like a serious, serious, overkill for a small nail stuck in the tire. But b/c of policy they couldn't repair the tire, it had to be replaced, for one tiny nail. We were on the road and the spare-tire we had would not make any long journey to New York or Atlanta.Photo 072906 001
Enter stage right, our anonymous hero. I don't want to get into the synchronistic miracle that brought this roughed individual to our rescue, let us say the cosmos was conspiring with us. He pulled out the nail, plugged the tire, we filled it up with air, and all was well. We "plugged" the flat in "mechanic speak." And that's that, in 3 minutes, we where besides ourselves, all fixed. He hardly heard our "thank you's" and goodbyes and he was on his way. We made it the rest of the trip to New York with no problems.

A link to flat tire:
http://maps.google.com/maps?q=http://trail.motionbased.com/trail/kml/episode.kml?episodePkValues=1142806
Flat

So lets review so I can coin a term. When I called my insurance company's emergency road side assistance, they were very friendly and great. But they offered us an insane overkill in fixing the problem, and that's all they could offer. This is an example of "services glut." We are a services economy. And like spam exists in the information economy, "services glut" exists in the services economy. Services glut is a costly and entirely out of proportion solution to a small common problem. No national services company wants to offer small economical services. It's got to be a big ordeal, it's got to be worth some money.... This creates a "services glut" which you often take when you are under enough pressure (like when you are stranded on the road, and it's your only choice). All I can say is this guy saved our trip and made me really admire his character, and by extension American's spirit and all earthly human nature. I'm serious.

Recent Images


    Heart
    A Road Trip and an Anonymous Hero
    Picture 2-7
    A Road Trip and an Anonymous Hero
    Photo 072906 001
    A Road Trip and an Anonymous Hero
    Flat
    A Road Trip and an Anonymous Hero
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