Ever the optimist, I thought that maybe I could just put some air in the tire, jack it back down, and get on with the mowing. I removed the valve cap and applied the air hose. There was the satisfying sound of inflation and I felt the tire starting to swell so I removed the air hose and was greeted with the demoralizing sound of deflation.
That was okay, though, because I knew that somewhere on the premises I had a spare inner tube that I could swap out. How hard could that be? I was to find out.
Finding the inner tube was the easy part. Installing it was a little more difficult. At first, I imagined that I could just pop the seal where the tire and wheel met, slide out the old tube, slide in the new tube, pump it up and Bob’ s yer uncle( whatever that means). But that isn’ t what happened. The wheel was not inclined to give up the tire or the inner tube without a fight.
I reckoned that I could hold my own in a regular kind of dust-up but I was not prepared for the WWE style smackdown that it turned into.
I got the wheel off the axle with only minor scrapes and contusions but when I got it on the ground, the real struggle commenced. I knelt on the tire to try to make an opening between the wheel and the tire but realized I had no way to pry the tire off. Not being a professional tire wrangler and thus not owning any tire wrangling tools, I had to improvise. So, I found a couple of screw drivers and a mallet to even the odds and rejoined the fray.
It was about three hours later that I finally declared victory. The new inner-tube was installed and inflated, the wheel was re-mounted and the bearings packed with grease. Then I trepidatiously lowered the jack. Everything looked good; no leftover parts. I was ready to wash up and celebrate with a big mug of ice tea. It was then that my phone rang.
I was exhausted but in a reasonably good mood when I answered the phone. The voice that greeted me was one of my oldest friends inviting me to meet him at one of our favorite watering holes for a beer.
Continued on 45
Sept./ Oct. 2022 • Our Brown County 37