hours and hours

My tire went flat less than 10 miles after merging onto I-64, my daily trek to work. I didn't really get what was going on at first, then I surprised myself at not panicking. I called David to see if he would wake up, then I called 911. Newport News dispatch transferred me to the State Police. I waited an hour. Then I called again. I called again an hour after that. Finally, almost three and a half hours after the initial phone call, a James City County officer stopped. Three police cars (for JCC or other areas) had gone past me already. This guy stopped on his way home from the overnight shift. On his way home! He didn't have to, but he did. I am incredibly happy he did, too, cause he called up a tow truck.
The reason the state police dispatch gave me as the reason they didn't come as quickly as they usually would was because they were all "at the college campus". This probably meant VA Tech, but could've also been ODU in Norfolk, since there was a threat yesterday that emptied the campus. Either way, I was out there for hours in my car.
Thankfully, I have the best, most understanding and forgiving department head there ever was. I called her up after I called the police. We figured I'd be there for 3rd bell. I called her at 8:20 to let her know I wasn't gonna make it, then again when the JCC officer showed up and asked her to call me back. I apologized to her many, many times when I was finally in the tow truck headed back to Williamsburg. I had already missed two out of my three classes and my spare was flat-- there was no way I was gonna make it. I ended up having to replace my two front tires. One was flat, one was gonna be that way soon. I had to get my car re-aligned. And they put air in my spare tire to see if that's all it needed. I got home around 1 PM.
Lucky for us, we got our tax returns already. Otherwise, we'd be completely screwed. $125 for towing. $250 for tires. We just bought those tires about 3 months ago, too. And they realigned the damn thing then. We think it had to do with when we got the ball joints/front end repaired. Remember that noise my car was making? It was the parking brake not disengaging, but it was good we replaced the ball joints anyway (otherwise, who knows what would have happened to my car while I was driving it? I think I prefer the flat tire to a totaled car or death.) After the ball joints being replaced, the steering wheel seemed to be incredibly loose. You go over a bump, sometimes you would have to hold on to the wheel incredibly tight or fight it from going all wobbly and all over the place. We had no clue if this was normal or whatever. We probably should have called. The alignment was incredibly off, which messed up the tires, leading to the flat tire this morning and another $375 to add on to March's total for car repairs of $600. We have now spend almost $1000 (I added in the belts and filters we've had to buy) repairing this damn car since we've been to Virginia. It hit the 100,000 mile mark and it all went to hell! haha. It's all good, though. At least I'm not dead. The VW Jetta has done me good and hangs in there even when it's supposed to be falling apart. The parts we have replaced on this car should have crapped out long before we replaced them. It's a really good thing we hadn't switched residencies from MI to VA before all of this, otherwise, we probably wouldn't have passed state inspection with the car.
I kind of needed a day off anyway. My allergies have been acting up (the pollen is crazy! it's everrrrywhere) and I've felt incredibly exhausted and overwhelmed with getting back into the groove of school after break, kids being cranky, it being the end of the year, and the whole research paper unit. It's made me an easy target for crying and wanting to give it all up. Last night, I started feeling more "up", though. This morning, I only had a few thoughts of: "Wait, why am I doing this again? Do I really feel like getting harassed today by a few cranky ass teenagers who need to get a good slap upside the head by their moms? Why am I putting myself through this?". I've been as whiny as my kids. It's starting to go away though. We'll get into the swing of th research paper and get going.