Drove down to Penske (they pronounce it pensky, final e being among the unpronouncible things in english) and bought new tyres. Not that the old ones were brinerke (after Yul Brinner), but this did feel a lot better and I did feel a lot safer on the highway. Not that I was doing a lot of it, but just driving Go to the community college was risky enough with the old ones.
The same day Rick came and helped me change the starter. Well the bill for the starter says this day; the bill for the tires says 17th (which is probably correct, and my note on the spreadsheet is suspect). The starter is somewhere between the engine and cabin, so there's very little room and no way to see what you're doing. We had to do everything by touch - and the first couple of screws we got off were wrong ones, so we had to screw them back and find the right ones. Then take that to Advanced AP, trade it in for a new (refurbished) one and then went back to the car to screw it in again. Amazingly, it all just worked from the first try.
Along the way visited his place, took a few shots of his kids, emailed them later.
Went to the lake couple more times. Discovered another lake, south of town, more forest and less sand, but went there only that one time, more than half an hour drive to there.
Fourth time went to Hydraulic lake again (date unknown, but I guess up to 20th), with a different plan. I took the girls during my lunch break, not waiting for the weekend, and drove back to work. Around 16:00 a torrential rain came down, a true summer storm. Greg and I stood by the windows, with dozen others, looking how a car burns on the big mall parking, right behind the McD. A thunderbolt stroke it, random luck, among two hundred other cars. I wasn't much afraid for my girls, there's a solidly built terrace with roof held by thick beams, they can stay dry and no tree would fall on them there. After hours I drove there to pick them, found nobody. Closed. What now? Drove home, found them there, dry already. What happened?
The lakes (and other beaches) are the city parks' utility service's domain. It's a public enterprise, still an enterprise like any other. Among other things, they are in charge of visitors' safety. In american litigational milieu it means that as soon the rain got serious they locked up and shooed everybody out. They don't care that the visitors need to drive down a curvy hill road, during a downpour, that the trees and heavy branches are falling, the power cables disrupted and lying on the road in many places, and mostly not insulated (they mostly don't dig their cables in, poles everywhere), they don't care. They can die if they want, but they won't do it on our premises during our watch. So everybody out, we don't want to be responsible.
They hitched a ride, had to walk just the last two blocks.
13-XI-2017 - 25-III-2026