"Sometimes a Woman Just Needs Her Husband"

So, yesterday was a day for the book "Worst days ever" . There is just no other word to describe it. I won't go into any of the junk that went on, but if you are interested, you can look at my last blog entry to see a major part of what was going on. Suffice it to say, it a day filled with frustration and stress. Now let me set the stage for this story. 

After hours of dealing with the "junk" of the day, I figured I'd better run to the store to pick up a couple of things I needed to make dinner. I happened to be in the downtown area already, so I decided I could make the trip faster to just run in Save A Lot and be in and out faster than I could drive to one of the other stores. So, I ran in, picked up the items I needed and went to the front of the store to check out. I was shocked to find that the line to the cashier was literally 17 people in front of me and only one cash register open. I saw 2 other employees standing nearby and figured they'd open a lane. Did not happen. The woman at the front of the line was giving the poor cashier fits over every single item he rang up.  People were getting very irritated and very loud. I walked over to the other employees and politely asked, "Do you think maybe you could open another lane to speed things up." One of the guys laughed and said, "He's learning, just be patient."  My blood began to boil, so rather than lose it, I just turned a walked out of the store. People began screaming, and by the time I reached my van, there were at least 5 more people that had walked out of the store as well.  Not a good way to run a business.

But this is just the set up to my story. Just as I pulled out of the parking lot to head to another store, my phone rings and it was my wife. Yesterday was her first day back to work after the summer. She called to tell me that her car would not start, that the battery was about dead. Now, for those of you who do not know, my wife works almost an hour away, in Peoria. I told her that she needed to see if someone could give her a jump. She was a bit put out by that, but she asked someone. She called me back just a couple of minutes later and said that they had tried, but it did not help. Now, I have to be honest. I just knew by what she was describing that who ever had tried to help her did not know what they were doing. So, I suggested that they try push starting her car. Again, she was not happy, but tried. She called me back very frustrated. By this time, I already knew the score and was already on the interstate heading there. I'm thinking to myself that either these people did not know what was going on, or it was more than I'd be able to fix in a school parking lot, and I'd have to call a tow truck. But I was betting on the former being true. 

About 50 minutes later, I arrived at the school, called my wife to come out and raised the hood to her car and mine. As soon as I touched the jumper cables to my battery, her car started honking it's horn. I got in and turned the key and it started right up. 
Three things... 
1) Somehow the panic button on my wife's key fob had to have been hit and the car had honked until the battery was all but dead. When I got there, it was still trying to honk, but all it was doing was making a thumping sound, for there was not enough juice left to sound the horn.
2) When I raised the hood, the plastic cover over her battery post was in place and covered with dust and grease, no finger prints. So, I knew immediately that whoever the good Samaritan was that tried to help her knew nothing about cars and had placed the jumper cable over the plastic cover, not making contact with the battery.
3) What about the push starting? This one left me puzzled, until I got home and asked my wife. It seems none of them had ever done this before, so what they were trying to do was that they pushed the car, and when they got it going, she tried to turn the key on to start the car. 
I really did not know whether to be mad or laugh!

It was all just the perfect conclusion to a terrible day. When my son came home I was telling him about this and how frustrated I was and that added to everything else, I wasted not only 2 hours, but about $18 worth of gas. To this, my wife smiled and said, "But what you don't understand is that sometimes a woman just needs her husband!"

Touche' hon. Touche'.