I'm getting to the point that I fear driving in North Carolina, because an exceptional percentage of car breakdowns happen to me there. The most recent one actually didn't happen in state, I'd just passed the TN border and was coming down the exceedingly twisty road to Shady Valley when I lost the engine on Mom's car.

About the time I gave up on letting it cool down and trying things, a white convertable pulled up and I got a lift down to Shady. Since this was a beautiful Sunday, the country store there had at least 500 motorcycles out front. I borrowed one of the bikers' cell phones, called a tow, and sat in a rocker on the porch and watched the insanity for an hour.

The good thing about driving old cars that sometimes break down is that you do get used to dealing with it. I actually enjoyed 95% of the incident.

Oddly, the car started without problems the next morning. Curse indeed.