A look behind-the-scenes of MORE 104.1 on July 4, 2017:

We thought we got lucky, we finished the Waukee parade just as the storm was moving in, so our whole crew stayed dry, yay! But… (This is a little long, but I wanted to share because my crew deserves a shout-out.)

I was driving the MORE vehicle, so I dropped Jay and his son at home and was on my way to take Mariah to her car, then back to the station for our promotions manager Jenny and me. As we made the curve from I-80 to 80/35 North I said, “Oh, I better slow down, I don’t know how these tires are.” I was joking! But…

Just past the Hickman exit, the front left tire blew – going 70. Luckily, I am relatively skilled behind the wheel. (Thanks, Dad.) And I was able to slow and get us to the side of the road safely. I would have gone for the next exit but we immediately hit the rim and I was afraid I would damage the wheel.

It’s at this point we realize that the service company we use is closed for the holiday.  And, the jack is missing from the vehicle. (This is adding up.) So, I called Jay who is starting to cool off from the parades, and he heads our way to assist. Then I call the Urbandale Police Department to see if a police officer can come sit behind us while we change the tire, because no one is moving over – please folks, move over a lane, it can be a bit terrifying.

While we are waiting, Mariah, Jenny and I move everything from the back of the vehicle to see if we can find the tools – they later show up under the backseat because, why not. But that also makes room for the dead tire I will throw in later.

Jay arrives and grabs the manual to figure out how to get the spare from under the vehicle. Then the UPD kindly arrives and turns on their lights. And just as we are starting to wind the tire down, the first drops hit. I looked at Jay and said, “Yep, seems about right.” And then it proceeded to rain harder than any shower I have been out in – ever – the entire 20 minutes or so it took us to change the tire. LOL. (And yes, we did our best to have a sense of humor at the time as well.)

Once we had the tire on, and everything put away, I went and thanked the UPD Officer for sitting with us. She was very kind. Then we drove to the next exit to air up the spare because, naturally, it only had 15 pounds of air in it. I thanked Jay again for coming and saving us because, without his jack and lug wrench twisting, we would have been out there MUCH longer.

So, that’s a long way to describe this photo, taken by Mariah. (I had her and Jenny stay in the vehicle because there was no point in anyone else getting soaked to the bone – and it was safer.) This is pretty early on in the process as Jay is starting to get the jack going, and no – I am not crying – my sunscreen was washing straight into my eyes causing an incredible fire. The upside was, it was raining so hard it all washed back out of my eyes about two minutes later.

Takeaway – the people I work with are amazing! (Especially Jay.) -Kate