Who would've thunk?

The last time I got my tires changed was back in, umm, well, I can't remember. I remember going to a store (WalMart), and telling the guy I needed new tires, and about an hour and 45 minutes later, bang, I had new tires. I didn't know how big they were, what their speed rating was, what the tread life was going to be, or whether I needed the extra road-warranty inusrance thingie, or whether or not I wanted to dispose of my old tires myself or wanted them to be disposed at an extra $6.50 per tire, or what the installation fee per tire was going to be, or if I had to gently pat my tire-mechanic's head as he'd be doing the job... I had a 1990 Accord LX back in school, and I wanted things cheap.

About 6 months ago, a friend of mine noticed that my car’s tires were going bald. I said, “huh, thats interesting”and kept driving. For 6 months. Yesterday, I woke up and was getting ready to go to the post office when I noticed there was something odd about my front tires. I took a closer look :

So, I decided I needed to get some new tires. Granted, I had in fact learned a thing or two about tires in chatting with my psychotic friends who race and stuff. The prudent thing to do, before heading off to a tire store, would be to research tires online first, right? I’m not kidding when I tell you I got a serious headache in trying to decide which tires to go with. I have an all-wheel drive car, and the reason I got one was because I liked going snowboarding up to the mountains*. So, performance summer tires weren’t going to cut it, because they wouldn’t make it in the snow. How about those ultra high-performance all-season tires which automatically inflate themselves if they go flat, and also shoot rubber bullets when you’re surrounded by Elektra King’s men? Reviews on tirerack.com say, nope, “I’ve found that with these tires my car hydroplanes”. About 2 hours later, I said, “screw this, I’m going to the post office”. The post office is about 6 minutes away. And I’ve never been more scared of something happening to my car in those 12 minutes. “What if my tires burst right now?” “What if my tires burst right now?” “How about now?” “And what if they bursttttttttttttttttt, now?”

After that petrifying drive, it hit me – the answer was not to get new tires. It was to get a new car… That’s right. A new car…

Its interesting how the human mind works – ok fine, its interesting how my mind works.

AI

PS: Yes, I got new tires yesterday. I got the Dunlop SP Sport FM901s. And, PLEASE, don’t tell me what you think of them, because I want to ignorantly live my life in bliss not knowing how these tires are going to perform, or howmuch more road noise I’m going to hear, or how it handles when you make that 90 degree turn off your on-ramp.
PPS: I came very close to selling my car yesterday.

* – FYI : since I’ve bought my car, I haven’t been snowboarding once. I live in the North-West parts of California (San Francisco) and it snows here once every 74637 years. It rains here plenty, but its no Seattle. So did I ever need an AWD? I dunno…