Well, I set out for Shore Leave yesterday around 1 PM, planning to make about half the journey Thursday afternoon and the rest Friday morning. It pretty much worked out that way, except that a little after six, just short of the Ohio/West Virginia border, I heard a familiar sound and realized I needed to pull over to the shoulder, just before I started to smell the burning rubber. Yep, for the second time in four years, I got a flat tire. And it’s symmetrical, since that was the left rear tire on the way back from the convention, and this was the right front tire on the way to the con. Ironically, I’d made a point of checking the tires at the rest stop I’d left shortly before, and they all looked perfectly intact. The state trooper who stopped by to check on me after I called for help suggested that something may have hit the tire and torn it, but the tow truck driver thought it was also possible that it had just blown out, though he didn’t rule out an impact. (Ironically, back at the very start of my drive, less than half a mile after I got onto the freeway from my home neighborhood, I had to swerve a bit to avoid a ladder that must have fallen off a truck and was right there in my lane. The adjoining lanes weren’t clear, so I had to just scooch over within the lane and pray I cleared it all the way, which I barely did.)

But it could’ve been a lot worse. Since I have front-wheel drive, I’d always feared that if a front tire blew out at highway speed, I’d go spinning out of control or something. Instead, I had no loss of performance or steering at all that I noticed, though maybe that’s just because I caught it soon enough to pull over. And I happened to be just half a mile from the St. Clairsville, Ohio exit, so it only took a few minutes for the tow driver to take me to the garage the patrolman had recommended, which was fortunately open until 8:30 and had the right size of tire in stock. And as it happened, the garage was in the same shopping center as a motel of the chain I usually stay at on my Shore Leave trips. I’d been planning to stop for the night fairly soon anyway, so it didn’t make much difference, except that if the tire hadn’t blown out, I probably would’ve made it another hour and stopped somewhere in Pennsylvania.

Weirdly, my GPS this year didn’t detour me around Wheeling, WV via I-470, as it usually does to avoid the lower speed limit on I-70 passing through the city. I don’t know why, but I’d guess maybe there was construction slowing down traffic on 470, or something.

So anyway, the rest of my drive this morning and afternoon was straightforward, and the new suitcase and backpack cooler I bought did indeed make it a bit easier to bring my bags into the hotel, though the cooler is a bit less roomy than my old insulated grocery bag, so I needed a second bag to carry my non-chilled foods in. And that’s even though I forgot to bring the cereal bars and carrot sticks I bought for the trip, and gave up on bringing the big jug of iced tea I bought because there just wasn’t room for it. I also forgot my usual pencil, pen, and notepad, though I have other pens.

Speaking of which, the first thing I did after showering and resting a bit was to take five copies each of Only Superhuman, Star Trek: The Original Series: The Higher Frontier, and Star Trek: TOS: Living Memory to the Aaron’s Books table in the dealers’ room for them to sell on consignment during the con. They’ll be available there all weekend, and copies of my eSpec Books titles will be available at the eSpec table nearby. I’ll also have copies of a few of my other books for sale at Meet the Pros tonight at 10PM to midnight, and I’ll have signing sessions at the Aaron’s Books table Saturday from 2:30-3:00 PM and Sunday from 1:30-2:00 PM. I hope I sell a lot of books, since thanks to my flat tire, this trip has already cost me over $200 more than I expected.