Beer Goggles #9 - Ladder-al Thinking
That's right a ladder themed post.
One afternoon in the Spring of 2018 my dad found a sharp metal object in one of the car tyres. Dad being dad he decided to try and change the tyre himself.
Armed with nothing but a rarely used toolbox, a single scissor jack, and the brief explanation from a YouTube tutorial he got to work.
All was going according to plan, the front left of the car was suspended by the scissor jack and the tyre had been unscrewed, all until:
Crash. Thud. AAAH HELP.
When he went to remove the tyre from the axel rod, the jack gave way and the front left side of the car dropped squishing his hand between the wheel well and the tyre.
Luckily my brother Fox was home and ran out to the garage to see what all the commotion was about. At this point my dad was squirming like a bug caught between a toddlers fingers, the pain so unbearable he began mumbling in some primal language lost to the annals of time.
The first thought that occurred to Fox was to channel his inner superman and attempt to lift the car with the power of his legs. A fairly athletic individual, he gripped the side of the car with both hands, inhaled a deep breath and proceeded to squat with all his might. Unsurprisingly, he failed to lift the two-ton car. Brute human strength alone was not going to solve the issue at hand (pardon the pun).
The garage was a tight space with only enough room for the car, a few bikes, and a ladder. Without even pausing after his first failed attempt, he scanned the area and went for the ladder, only just able to fit it under the side of the car closest to the still attached rear wheel. With another deep breath Fox took hold of the end of the ladder and began the second mightiest squat of his life, the veins in his neck bulging from the effort. Just as the middle of the ladder began to bend from the force, a tiny gap opened up just wide enough for a finger to be yanked free.
BANG.
Fox dropped the ladder with a groan of relief. Dad took off his wedding ring in anticipation of a very swollen set of fingers and the two looked at each other and embraced.
There are a few takeaways I get from this story.
The intended use is not the only use with a bit of creativity
And always have someone spot you when you are changing a tyre.
And that concludes the tale of how a bit of lateral thinking helped my dad keep his fingers.
A few hours later a handy man came round and changed the tyre in five minutes.
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