Some People Have Good Karma

I think I mentioned that Tucker originally didn't want the Subaru because it wasn't "cool" to which I replied "Son, you can't afford cool" Apparently he can when it's free! Yes, the car you see to the left was free!! (Not the ham standing next to it but the actual car). Dennis was telling a co-worker about the search for a replacement car for Tucker after the accident. Kyle (the co-worker) casually says he has a 1998 Isuzu Trooper and Tucker could have it if he wanted. Just like that. What's the catch you might wonder? Well, it needed to be licensed and the check engine light was on. That is an automatic failure at the emissions testing place and you have to pay at least $150 to get it fixed or approved if not fixed. (Kyle thought it was $500). So Dennis & Tucker went to check it out and of course thought it was a fine vehicle. They drove it home. Just before going to the emissions testing place, Dennis unhooked the car's computer after which it had to reboot or something. Regardless, the "check engine" light stayed off long enough to pass the emissions test (it turned back on about 20 minutes later). Licensing it was just under $100 and the front wind sheild needs to be replaced, but that's it. So while not exactly without a cost attached, it was a free vehicle to Tucker.
It was a little dirty inside because Kyle had been using it for dump trips, but nothing a little afternoon elbow grease by Tucker and Spencer couldn't cure. It obviously is not as fuel effecient as the Subaru was, but heck it was free! And the cool factor. Oh that's way up.

It Happens to Everyone

I guess it is inevitable that you will have a fender bender at some point in your life. And, if you are a teenager (or old), that is probably going to happen sooner rather than later. We would be dreaming if we didn't think it would happen to Tucker at some point. Yesterday it did. Of course we kind of assumed that it would be Tucker's fault, but in this instance it wasn't! Shocking I know. I got a frantic call from him yesterday at work around 11:30am saying his he had crashed into the back of a tow truck (how ironic is that??) and that it wasn't his fault because there was an oil slick or something. I can't say that I was exactly maternal. I was having a crappy day myself for various reasons so the first thing I said was "I don't need this today, I just don't need this." and then follwed that with "Oil slick? Yeah, right." Regardless of the intial "all about me" response, I did ask who was in the car and if everyone was okay (luckily yes). Then I hopped in the van (luckily I hadn't walked to work that day) and drove down to his school and the scene of the accident.
Turns out there was an "oil slick" which stretched almost 20 blocks!! I hit a little of it on my way to the accident. It was like hitting a patch of ice, where your brakes kind of seize up.
Tucker had been taking 3 friends for lunch and was coming to a stop at the light right by his school. He hit a particularly big patch of oil and all effort to stop was pointless. The thing that stopped him was the tow truck in the lane next to him. He ran right into the part they hook up to tow you. It looked like he was going to be towed. The tow truck driver and the guy in the truck behind him both confirmed to the police that Tucker was not speeding but driving slowly and there was no way to avoid the accident.
It was pretty scary but as I say, no one was hurt. Tucker is a little sore today and I told him to check on his friends to see how they were today. Unfortunately, his car is not. It's pretty much a goner. We only had it insured for liability because it was so old. He's pretty bummed about the car naturally.
So here's the kicker to the whole story. Turns out the "oil slick" came from a fire truck!! It was leaking transmission fluid all the way down 15th Ave. Tucker just happened to hit the big pile where it had stopped for the light. In fact the fire truck was not too far in front of them! I guess they figured it out about three more lights down the street and finally pulled over. According the the cop at our accident, there were a couple other fender benders reported north of where we were. They ended up closing off most of the street for the rest of the afternoon. Dennis is hoping to get some kind of compensation for Tucker from the city for the fire truck basically causing the accident. I'm not holding my breath on that one.
Best thing is to just focus on the fact that no one was hurt. It could have been much worse, but fortunately, someone was looking out for Tucker yesterday!

Baseball & Woodshop

You may have been wondering what we have been up to since it has been so long since I posted. Me, I haven't been up to much other than major hay fever, sinus congestion and itchy eyes. The weather here has been really warm, and I always get this way when the weather starts to heat up like that in the spring.

Meanwhile, Dennis has been coaching Cooper's baseball team. They finished the regular season in 2nd place (out of 4 teams) and that's the way they ended the recent seasoning tournmant. In fact, all four teams ended in the same spot. The tournmant was a nail biter though, especially the last game. They were playing the #1 team and needed to win two games to stay in. Dennis is a pretty mellow coach and I think the parents and kids like him. These pictures are not from that game howevernnis figured it was going to be a blowout because he had used up the alloted number of pitches for both his best pitchers, so they couldn't pitch in the game. He had to use the B team pitchers. They performed incredibly well. Dennis' team lead the whole game and it had to go into extra innings when they were tied at the end of 6 innings. At the last at bat for the #1 team, we had the lead and they needed to score two points to win. The son of Dennis' assistant coach was pitching. He's just this little, itty-bitty kid (about the same size Tucker was at that age probably) and he got two outs on them and we still had the lead. It looked like we might just pull it out, but alas, it was not to be. The other team won on a very close throw to 1st base followed by them stealing home to win when eveyone wasn't paying attention after missing getting the out. Kind of a cheesy way to win if you ask me. The boys were a little disappointed naturally, but Dennis did a good job of building them up and pointing out how amazing it was that they played so well with the not-so-good pitchers.

The baseball pictures of Cooper are not from that game however. That was a hot Saturday afternoon. Cooper played catcher the whole game. He traded off playing catcher with another boy on the team. He did a pretty good job of it too. Takes after his mom & dad since we both played catcher when we played baseball. Cooper actually had an amazing triple in the final tournament of game. He's a pretty decent batter when he watches the ball or doesn't swing at high pitches. We were all ready for the season to be over. The games were every Wednesday & Saturday from mid-April through May and they were usually long and painful to watch (lots of walks). The final game started at 6pm and didn't end until 9pm.

This other picture is of Tucker's latest creation in Woodshop. He was quite proud of it. I think he took this picture

so he could post in on Facebook. I think he did a really good job on it. He made me a smaller candle holder for Mother's Day. It looks equally as nice, though much smaller. I am getting the feeling that he is not going to be a desk job kind of kid. He works two jobs now, one at a local Safeway and the other at the local fruitstand where he worked last summer. He totally loves the hard work and he does work hard at the fruitstand.

I guess if I was fair, I would give Spencer some equal billing but I've already posted a goofy self-portrait of him in an earlier post and that's still pretty much what's available picture-wise. He left his camera on the coffee table recently and Dennis was checking out what pictures he had, which Spencer calls "creepy", but if he didn't always take pictures of himself maybe it wouldn't be so "creepy". Once again they were all mostly self-portraits, some of which gave us quite a chuckle. Such a funny kid. Maybe when he is at "Idaho camp" his aunt help him learn to take pictures of things besides himself!!