What a day!

Today started in a good way. Jesse woke up and got Rosalee out of her crib and brought her into bed for some snuggle time. We watched Dora while Zeke slept and Jesse got ready for the day. Both Jesse and I had a great feeling that something exceptionally good was going to happen today. Jesse took the day off of work because we planned on going up to Rexburg for the job fair at BYU-Idaho. Jesse looked online and found several companies that would be at the job fair and are in his job field. So we bathed and dressed the children, printed out a few resumes, and got in the car.
The kids were great on the trip up to Rexburg- Zeke slept and Rosalee looked at her books. We got to Jesse's grandparents' house and Rosalee squealed with delight as she ran for the door. I ate lunch with Rosalee, Zeke again slept, and Jesse went to the school to attend the career fair. Jesse didn't come back right away so I assumed he was busy talking with people. I put on a movie for Rosalee and started to relax when the door opened and Jesse came inside. He told me that EVERY one of the jobs for his field DIDN'T show up! They all skipped the event but he still talked with a few places just for the heck of it. I was discouraged but tried to stay positive. We got to see his grandparents, I ate some delicious potato salad and barbecue ribs, and Rosalee was happy to see GG (her great grandmother).
Jesse had physical therapy for his shoulder (he had surgery on it a few weeks back) at 4pm so we left his grandparents' house around nap time. Within minutes of leaving, both kids were asleep in the car. I thought to myself, "I wish Jesse didn't have therapy today so the kids would be able to sleep longer and I could have the whole day with him." NOTE TO SELF- STOP, I repeat STOP wishing for more time with your husband! The past few times you have done so something bad/annoying has happened allowing you more time with him! On our way to the gas station we heard a weird noise coming from under the car. Jesse looked around but couldn't see anything at the gas station so we decided to try and ignore it and head home. Further down the highway the noise got worse and we started to worry. Then a LOUD noise (like a rock hitting our windshield) shot off and the driver side front tire started making weird sound. Jesse unrolled the window and guessed that the tire had gone flat so we pulled off the road. While the children continued to nap Jesse, in his nice interview outfit, changed the tire and I called the therapy office to cancel his appointment. Then I called the tire company I bought four new tires at in July and asked if my tire could be fixed. They told me to take the car into the store in Idaho Falls and they should be able to help me at little to no cost.

After driving 50 on the highway with our spare donut tire we FiNaLlY made it to Big O Tire in Idaho Falls. They took our car in the back and we went into the small waiting room. I turned on Dora (we seem to watch that a lot lately...) for Rosalee and Jesse and I just stared at each other. "What next?" I asked him. "I have no idea," was his answer.

Feeling dejected I looked at the pictures on the wall and apparently so did Jesse because he said, "I find it weird when people hang pictures of pheasants on the wall to show off wildlife. Pheasants aren't from here, they come from China." This was news to me and helped distract me from the current situation for a few minutes. Then a little girl came in the waiting room and started talking to Rosalee in mostly Spanish with a few English words. Rosalee just smiled and sat down next to her. I watched the two of them talk to each other, share the girl's doll, and laugh. It was so sweet to see her making a friend even though they didn't speak the same language. Then the father handed the little girl two cups filled partially with skittles and the girl handed one to Rosalee. So I got a quarter and bought some M&Ms for the girls to share. Next a man came in the waiting room and some how we started talking about Jackson, Wyoming. He told me how he's met Harrison Ford and Dick Cheney there and now lives in Idaho. I asked what do people do in Wyoming and he said, "hunt or fish in the summer and ski in the winter. The funniest thing is they all want to hunt pheasant and they aren't even from here, they're from China!" What the!? Is that an Idaho known fact? So I told the man, "that's funny you say that because just a few minutes ago I learned from my husband that pheasants are from China. Is that an Idaho thing?" He said, "maybe, but it helps that I do wildlife surveys for a living." So then Jesse piped in with how he went to school for wildlife, has a degree, has done wildlife surveys, etc. By the end of the conversation the man handed Jesse a paper with four different companies to contact about doing some wildlife sampling and surveys for. One, the company he works for, he wrote down the name of his boss and the phone number to reach him at!

Job fair- 0

Big O Tire- 4

Weird!

Even better was the fact that we got a brand new tire for free and it is a better quality tire than we had because that brand is on back order! So when we finally left I called my mom and told her the craziness of our day. Now you need to know that my mom isn't the most religious person. In fact she's really more spiritual than anything. But this is what she said, rather seriously I might add, "God put the nail in your tire." I responded with, "Um, what? Hahaha." Then she said, "The Lord works in mysterious ways." I had no choice but to agree.

After stopping at Subway for dinner we headed home confused at how the day had turned out. Then out of curiosity I went online and looked up the company that the man (whose name I didn't catch) from the tire store told us he worked for. Under the open job postings there were 6 jobs that Jesse would be both qualified and interested in doing! So tomorrow he plans on calling the boss of the company and talking to him. So we'll see if this turns out to be anything for us or if it just ends in another dead end.

Either way, it makes for a great story.