My 90 self exile and how it came to be

Well this is how it all started. Names have been changed to protect the identity of the uninnocent....

In preparation for a long period of unemployment, In October, I set about updating some things on my car that I knew needed fixing . In October, I went to the dealership for an oil change and whilst they were doing that, they told me I had four nails in each of my
rear tires. So I took the car right on over to Firestone Complete Auto Care where I had
purchased an addtl road hazard warranty when I bought the tires and told them that I had 

 four nails in each tire. They confirmed it and as part of the warranty, replaced

the two rear tires. For free. So my car had been making this wobble wobble

noise for ages and I knew it was the tires so it was
just a stroke of luck that those two rear ones were damaged already. Therefore, I set about
saving the money for the remaining two tires to be replaced. Because there was really

nothing wrong with them, they wouldn't have replaced them for
free. Anyhow, In January I receive a Firestone coupon by email for 15% of tires and this saved me $34 on two new tires as long as I used the coupon by Jan 31. I was in Crescent Springs Kentucky at the time visiting my cousin and Chicago was in the middle of a 21 inch blizzard so I decided to get my new tires there while I waited out the blizzard. We found a Firestone fairly close in Cincinnati. I got the 2 remaining tires and got my wheels aligned

since I have a free lifetime wheel alignment and I was very pleased
with my purchase. Fast forward to February 16th. On the 16^th, I was headed out

to run some errands. I had heard a noise and people were looking at me funny so I parked the car in the Walgreens parking lot and got out and circled the car. Lo and behold the tire was completely out of air but it wasn't making that impossible sound that flat tires usually make. I didn't want to go into Walgreens & shop cause I was afraid I
would come out & not be able to move it so I struck while the iron was hot & hot

tailed it over to my moms house (about 4 miles away). I parked the car in front of her house and said "can you call Jason and ask him to come look at my tire? I think the tire is flat'" Jason is her good friend. Instead of doing that she said "he said he was coming over after he finishes helping Ramondo do something today". This is not
what I had asked but ok. At 3:30 she says "if he doesn't come by 3:00, he usually isn't coming". Ok but if you had called and told him that I needed him (like I had originally asked),
perhaps he would have made an effort to stop by. That's what I was thinking but I didn't say
it out loud. But I was thinking it. I just sighed instead. My Aunt Birdie stopped by my moms to pick up her dog. My mom dogsits for her. She told me Ramondo's nephew (Shooks) could probably come by and see if it could be repaired. She called for me but Shooks was at work and would not be out until dark and could not give an approximate time that he could stop by the following day. But I was stuck so I said ok I'd wait until tomorrow.I asked Birdie for a ride home ( 2 miles or so) and she gladly obliged. My other aunt, Wilma, called
me and said she heard I had a flat and did I want it fixed? I said yeah and she said Ramondo ( who is her beau or something like that) would fix it in the morning. So in the morning, she gave me a ride to my moms. I called Shooks and cancelled and told him his uncle was gonna come instead. I looked up Firestone locations by zipcode on the world wide web and the closest one was 30 miles out. I called and told the man that answered that I had a flat and could not drive out there and was there anyone in Hot Springs that would honor the road hazard warranty and fix it. For free.
He said no. He said they didn't have any brother or sister stores in Hot Springs. I asked him could I buy a new tire in Hot Springs and then come out there and get my money back for it. He said he didn't know about that. He said the best thing to do was to put the spare on and ride on over and they'd fix it no problem.I didn't press it cause it sounded like a plan to me

and that was what I intended to do. So when Ramondo came over, I asked him to put the donut on and he said he had an air compressor and was just gonna put enough air in it to drive someplace and get a new tire. I reiterated that I had just gotten these tires less than 6 months ago and that I had a warranty and Firestone would fix it. For free.
I told him what the guy said. First Ramondo said there was a Firestone dealer

out on Airport Road. I asked him the name of it because I wanted to call. I guess he didn't know. He and aunt Wilma left for a few minutes to get something and when he came back,

 he had a different firestone dealer for me out on Summer Road right next to blah,blah, blah. He had called ahead and they said "Come on down! We'll take care of her". And take care of me they did. Ramondo said it didn't make sense to fool around with that donut when there was a Firestone right here. He said that ole guy at Firestone in Benton was just trying to

make money off of me. I told him that the guy wasn't gonna make any money off me

cause he was gonna replace my tire. For free. Ramondo says the Benton guy gets money

for the tires he sends back to Firestone. I don't know the protocol of how
these warranties work and I don't care but all I know is that it works in my favor and

I can get a new tire. For free. Anyhow, I guess that was enough jibber jabber cause

Ramondo told me to hurry up and drive over to Summer rd before the air went back out.

 (I felt like I had to rush over there on borrowed time. No time to think things over very clearly.) Benton was too far out for me to chance getting stranded with a bad tire

so I went to the shop Ramondo had called that said they would take care of me. First thing I ask when I get there is are they gonna honor that warranty and they say no
they can't cause they are not an affiliate of Firestone. He say the tire can't

be repaired (which I knew from previous experience that driving on the rim when it's flat like that will shred the inside of the tire so I believed him). And he says that a new tire

is $127 with tax, disposal, everything. To add insult to injury. They may be
a firestone dealer but they don't have a firestone tire for me. All they have is goodyear. WTF. I'm here now & I need an effing tire. I don't wanna come back and I refuse to ask

Ramondo to put the donut on again so eff it.
I let them put the tire on and I drive back to moms. But I am NOT pleased with my purchase. One, it was $127 vs FREE. Ramondo did not take the time to get his facts straight or

 maybe he did but he just didn't care since it wasn't his money.
Two, it's not even a firestone tire so I coulda went somewhere else that didn't look like they had been storing tires for decades. Like one of those places on the movies with buzzards flying over it. I bet Ramondo has never even been here to have HIS car serviced. I coulda went to Walmart. Half the town goes there so they probably rollover their tires fairly often.
Three,this $127 tire doesn't even have a road hazard warranty so if IT goes flat IT will NOT be fixed. for free. So I pay and I head to my moms but I could have spit fire. You could have cracked an egg on my head and it would have been COOKED! I was a true taurean. There was smoke comin' out of my nostrils and ears. As soon as I get in the door, mom tells me

 so helpfully that Jason would have put the donut on if I had left the keys at her house last night. Well I was only 2 miles away so if he really wanted to fix it, he could have come & got the keys OR if she had called him when I first ASKED her to & told him what I asked
her to, he could have told me to LEAVE the keys then. But I am totally 100% uninterested in what someone WAS going to do for me after I don't need them to do it for me anymore.

I told her that from now on, if she needed me she need not look too hard cause home is where I'd be for the next 90 days. For the next 90 days I would be on a self exile until I recouped the unnecessary $127 I had just spent. $1 at a time. I HAD been spending $20 a week on gas and that would last for 7 or 8 days . So if I don't go anywhere except to the grocery store once a week, then I should save at least $40 a month.I had BEEN riding to the post office (for my ebay sales), walmart, kroger, wendy's $1 menu (cause I didn't have a stove at the time), to Aunt Birdie's to visit, out to eat with the Family on Sunday's, out for birthdays (Kora's, moms and birdies), to  the flower shop to buy my mom flowers throughout her medical ordeal, Sonic happy hour where they have 1/2 price sweet tea and strawberry limeaids from 2-4, the dollar store, dairy queen (for a little ice cream treat), the book store (the kindle book store),out looking for little unique things to put in Mo's easter box,

the movies, the red box, mcdonalds for sweet tea, to the hot water springs to fill up my bottles for free spring water. a ride here and there to familiarize myself with new areas and new ways to get places, a ride in the mountains or just a ride through the city after 9oclock when everyone else had gone to bed.
NO MORE. No Siree Bob. Not me. I'll go grocery shopping once a week and if I forget something,too bad. I'll make my own tea with tea bags in my very own tupperware pitcher.

I'll read the books I have.Mo has enough for his easter box. I don't need ice cream anyway.

I have hundreds of dvds from those  tv series on dvd, tons of VHS and even dvd movies I've never watched. I can drink tap water and the mountain will still be there when the 9

90 days are up. My hair doesn't need cutting if nobody is going to see me. I won't grow a unibrow but instead of going every 2 weeks to get my eyebrows done, I'll go every 3 1/2 weeks. Most importantly, I could save gas by not going to my moms house everyday. I supposed I was gonna still go to church and I'd go see her afterwards (we go to the same church a block and a half away from her house) My mom said, don't do this. It would be at her expense and she would pay for half of the tire but I said NO. If you pay for half of the tire, I will not learn the lesson I need to learn. Which is ...Go with your first mind. Don't let someone bamboozle you  into doing something that you don't want to do
and that you know isn't right for you. FOLLOW YOUR OWN MIND.
I told my mom that if she needed me to call and I would come and I would still take her to chemo and that once a week I'd take her to the stores, hairdresser or wherever she wanted to go.I told her we could just buy 1 gallon whenever we went out and that should do it. I left and went home. To further twist the knife in my back, the following day my aunt Wilma calls me and asked me did I get the new tire.  I said yeah. I had to pay $127 for it though and she said "WHAT???" I thought they said they’d take care of you. I said "They did take care of me. They sold me a tire for $127." I asked her did Ramondo even ask them were they
going to honor the road hazard warranty when he had called and she said she

didn’t know but she didn’t think so . We talked a few minutes more and then she hung up. See, I asked the RIGHT question when I called firestone. I asked who would give me a new tire. For free. Ramondo just asked sloppy questions but did not clarify the facts and I guess he didn’t understand that a firestone DEALER is not a firestone auto care center.
Aunt Wilma called back a few minutes later to tell me "Ramondo said… you need to go

back and get that tire and then take it to firestone"
I told her I am not spending another minute or more money on gas (driving back to that backwards tire shop and back and then to the firestone in Benton and back) on this tire. I have already spent $127 on this situation and that’s it! What I didn’t say out loud was that if Ramondo had put the donut on like I asked,..we wouldn’t even be having this conversation.
NOW he wants to give me advice after his first advice was jacked up. Well Stop, no and don’t. And that, folks, is how I came to be in a 90 period of self exile.It will be over

around May 16th which is right before my 40th birthday.